10-12 At Sea (the Bosporus, Sea of Marmara, & Dardanelles

We were up early to watch as we made our way out of the Black Sea and through the Bosporus Strait back to Istanbul.  When we left Istanbul five days ago, it was at night.  Today it was overcast, so our pictures weren’t as good as we had hoped to get.  There were two other ships docked in our old spot – the Queen Victoria and Holland America’s Princendom (sp!)  We were glad to see the latter because we have only great things about it.  It is one of the smaller ships.  While we took way too many pictures of the same things, we still liked the skyline of this amazing city.  Here is the outside of the Hague Sophia from the water (my picture of it in my Istanbul Blog entry showed just the inside):

Below is the outside of the Blue Mosque with its 6 minarets: 

These are two of the three main highlights on the skyline and make this city so recognizable as you enter the harbor.  Even in the mist, they are magnificent.  I had the third picture of the palace, but am having a hard time uploading my Blog, so am trying to eliminate one picture!

The Sea of Marmara is so wide, there was nothing to see but water. 

Going through the Dardanelles was interesting looking at it on a map.  It is very narrow.  But actually going through it was not very exciting – and not much to see or take pictures of.  The old city of Troy is at the entrance from the Dardanelles to the Aegean Sea, but you couldn’t see it from the water.  It is supposed to have a big wooden horse that kids play in. 

This was the last night for those passengers (1,500 of them!) leaving the ship the next day in Athens.  For the little over 300 of us who are continuing on, there was a cocktail party in the Crow’s Nest for what they call “the Collectors Voyage.”  Afterwards we had a farewell dinner with Craig and Makena in the Pinnacle Grill.  They also invited two women they had gotten to know as well.  It was a great meal – two flaming items – steak Diane and the baked Alaska dessert.

Since it was an early dinner, Doug and I went to the ship’s show again.  It was three performers from previous shows who joined together for their finale.  One was a magician, which we always go to see, but none of them were very good.  We were glad we hadn’t gone to their individual shows!