B – Bosphorus Strait: Where Europe Meets Asia on Water – A cruise through one of the world’s most strategic waterways.

 

B is all about the Bosphorus Strait which I actually had to google while we were on our trip!! Are you familiar with the Bosphorus Strait? 

According to Worldatlas.com, “Bosphorus Strait is one of the few straits that act as a boundary between two continents and at the same time divides a country into two portions. It has played an important role in politics, commerce, and European history.”

It is evidently the narrowest strait in the world and measures just a little over 2 miles at its widest. I'm writing from Alabama . . . so I converted kilometers to miles (3.7 to 2.29 - someone let me know if my calculation is not correct).

The Bosphorous Strait is a boundary between Europe (Turkey) and Asia and I thought it was so cool when they told us we would be standing on two different continents in one day!

As you can see, from the map above, The Bosphorus Strait (which I just noticed is spelled Bosporus like in ancient Greece!) connects the Sea of Marmara with the Black Sea. Just FYI - I also had to google Sea of Marmara while on the trip.

This is why I love to travel. I see parts of the world I know nothing about and learn something new about a very strategic waterway and the land around it.

The water was very calm. We left port and traveled at night so we didn't get to see much of the scenery - we were asleep!

The Bosphorus played and still plays such a strategic role in commerce and politics, too. This is from the WorldAtlas.com site, too: "Its control has been a subject of conflicts, including the Russo-Turkish War and the Battle of Gallipoli. In the 5th Century BC, it facilitated grain export from Scythia to Athens and allowed the Greek city to maintain an alliance with several other cities, including Byzantium and Megarian. In the 15th century, the Ottoman Empire constructed a fortification on both sides of the strait; Rumelihisari and Anaduluhisari. The increasing European influence over the strait in the 19th century led to the coding of rules governing its use."

Here are some photos of the Strait while we were still in port. It was grey and cloudy when we boarded the boat, but it was still pleasant enough to sit outside.

First of all, do you love to travel? Do you love learning new things? Do you have to google names and places while traveling or are you already familiar with the places from your own pre-trip research?

P.S. Today's blog title was generated by AI - but tweaked by me.

April Showers Brings . . .a New Hodgepodge!

1. No foolin'! April is here. What's one fun thing on your April calendar? We will host our neighborhood supper club group in a week or so! Easter, though it is a lot of work, is coming!

2. It's often said, 'A fool and his money are soon parted'...what's the last thing you wasted money on? Great question! Not long before Harvey died, I bought a little hand held vacuum cleaner. I did use it a few times but it is in one of the upstairs bathroom cabinets. I don't know if I wasted the money. . . I just don't use it often.

3.  April 2nd is National DIY day. Are you a do-it yourself kind of person or maybe you're married to one? If so, what's the last thing you DIY-ed. If you're not a DIY-er what's the most recent job you had to hire someone to complete? Our daughter and son-in-law are doing a MAJOR DIY on a house they have purchased. Mark is very handy - especially with plumbing. He is one of the few CFO's I've ever met who could also fix plumbing! He worked as a plumber's assistant in the summers when he was in college. I can do a little DIY.

4. Do you eat lamb? If so do you have a favorite dish that calls for lamb? My mother-in-law used to roast a leg of lamb and it was so delicious.

5. Do you fit a stereotype in some way? Explain. I am a middle-aged (actually maybe I'm an old) white woman. I've noticed that the older I get, the more invisible I become in random public settings.

6. Insert your own random thought here. I just looked up "old white lady memes." I'm not that old! haha!

I'm participating in the April A to Z challenge - and I would love for you to visit some this month!!

April A to Z - Azamara Pursuit - A Boutique Cruise Experience

I'm excited to participate in the April A to Z challenge once again! I want to give credit where credit is due . . .I did use AI as I crafted my A to Z list. We've been using AI often at work and I wanted to see what help it could offer me as I was feeling overwhelmed. To come up with the list, I did feed a LOT of info into ChatGPT and we had several "conversations." The writing each day is mine. AI crafted some of my daily titles.

With that said, let's jump right in and talk about the Azamara Pursuit, which is indeed a boutique cruise experience!

We boarded our ship in Galataport Istanbul. 

Prior to October 2024, Mark, nor I were "cruising people." Back when I was 20 or so, I went on a cruise to the Caribbean and had not been on a cruise ship since. Mark had never cruised before so the Azamara Pursuit was the perfect ship. This beautiful ship was launched in 2018.. As soon as we boarded the ship back in October, I fell in love with the ship immediately!

Mark and I decided to splurge on an upgraded room and it was worth every penny. I felt like I was "living in a movie" all week! As soon as we were on board, we were greeted with a glass of champagne! We arrived in our room and we found a bottle of champagne on ice waiting for us! 

We met our butler, Omar and our room steward, Christopher. They were totally amazing. They asked our drink preferences and then had our drinks (including a bottle of whiskey for Mark) delivered to our room. We ordered room service every morning and it was delivered and set up on our little table for us to enjoy. We were surprised by "tea" one afternoon. Diet Pepsi was not available but Omar kept me supplied with Coke Zero.

There are multiple restaurants, lounges, and bars on board. With our upgrade, we could dine anywhere but the food was so good in the main dining room that we only ate in one of the really nice restaurants one time. Our friends ate at the pool bar one night and they said it was good, too!

We enjoyed dining with some of our old and new friends!

Mark and Lu and Dave tried out the pool bar.

The food below was from the seafood buffet in the main restaurant. It was delicious.

Mark really enjoyed the gelato!

Here is a picture of some of us out on the deck outside the restaurant.

We had lovely amenities in our rooms. We were provided luxurious white fluffy robes and slippers and those robes came in handy when our breakfast was delivered each day.

Due to some sinus surgery I had a couple of years ago, I have to do a crazy nasal wash twice a day. When I shared that with our butler, he hand delivered a new bottle of distilled water to our room each day.

Our room was truly lovely with high quality linens and a comfy bed.

We had a mini fridge and bar area, along with drawers and a closet.

We had a small desk which I also used to dry my hair and put on my make-up.

Our bathroom was a great size - full size tub and shower, sink with lighted mirror and toilet.

We loved our little balcony!

As we were pulling out of port on the first night, the sunset was amazing.

It was so lovely up on the top of the ship.

Look at that sunset.

Even the stairwells inside the boat were luxurious.

We used one of the lounges every afternoon for our recap of the day.

 

Mark and I highly recommend Azamara. We felt like we were living in the lap of luxury all week. Our week on the ship was truly a boutique cruise experience.

Weekend in Review

I have had the hardest time loading photos into the blog lately! It won't add them all at once, so I have to add in tiny batches and sometimes it loads them backwards! These are ALMOST in order but not quite!

Last week was Spring Break for our oldest grand. On Friday, we met her mom at the Shell station (our meeting point) and brought our girl home with us. But first, we visited Tractor Supply. She and Pops checked out the farm vehicles.

We were hoping for baby turkeys . . .but they only had baby ducks. They sure were cute. Of course, we bought a few random things!

She and Pops played Barbie upstairs and then she and I crafted while our frozen pizza was in the oven. I bought those crafts at the Dollar Tree ($1.25 each) and they were really cute! 

I bought the seed ball at Tractor Supply and hung it in the yard. I don't think anyone has found it yet.

This is when they were playing Barbie upstairs - they had a Barbie farm because our girl loves cows right now and we bought a couple of play cows at Tractor Supply.

One morning over the weekend, THIS was our sunrise. It was spectacular. I was standing in our front door looking out and thanking God for a new day filled with new mercies!

I have on no make up but my cap and gown and honors cords arrived in the mail and I snapped a quick photo to send to our kids!

On Friday night, I drove around the circle and picked up Lu and Dave and we headed to Casual Pint. I had a new to me beverage. It was a mix of grapefruit and some other fruit. It was tasty.

On Saturday morning, we headed south to our daughter's house for our youngest granddaughter's first birthday party.

I picked up the geese in the dollar ($3 I think) bins at Target.

Our kids are twins - y'all know that, right? Laura and Glenn -- Laura's daughters both love their Uncle Glenn. When they won't go to any of us, they will go to him.

Here she is with her daddy and this was right before she grabbed one of those apples!

It was a low key first birthday - she had a couple of gifts from us and a gift from Uncle Glenn and his family.

The gift below was her favorite -- I imagine Aunt Lauren picked it out . ..but Uncle Glenn could be the shopper.

Here I am with all three of our grands. Heart is full.

Look at this cutie!!

Pops got some icing on his finger and put it in her mouth and she figured out quickly that it was tasty!!

I know we live in the south, but it is not really swimming weather yet . . .but these girls were going to swim - cold or not!

They both can swim. Both Laura and Glenn were early swimmers - they could jump off the diving board at 3 1/2 years old and do a crawl stroke to the ladder. I am not a strong swimmer, but Mark was. Both of these girls were early swimmers, too.

She finally cuddled up in Pops lap!!

She wanted my Diet Pepsi bottle!!

I had asked Laura if big sister needed a small surprise. She was the only for over 4 years and sometimes I think it is hard when a new baby arrives and gets all of the attention. She needed a new Elsa dress . . .and Gran was a winner. She loved it.

On Sunday morning, we had a Fifth Sunday Fellowship. We kept this one low-key since it was the first and it was the Sunday at the end of spring break and EVERYONE goes somewhere (but us!). Sunday was the fourth Sunday of Lent which is Laetare Sunday. Our pastors wear pink stoles and the paraments in the church are pink and we are encouraged to wear pink .. .so I bought pink tablecloths, plates, and napkins! It is really "rose" but pink is what we have! Laetare is a Sunday for rejoicing in the middle of Lent.

I grabbed a couple of photos - it was a success! Multi-generational and a decent number of folks attended = a success.

Here is a photo of some of the guys from our class.

For Sunday lunch, I fixed the tortilla smash burgers again. We love them!

And that is a wrap on our weekend!! What did you do?