Charting our trips after our cruise

We've arrived back from our 2 week Adriatic, Greece & Turkey, Greek Isles cruise on the fantastic Norwegian Gem. The places we visited in the two weeks were stunning examples of nature, architecture, engineering and modern wonders at their best. The weather was sunny the whole time so it made visiting the landmarks even more interesting. We visited Venice (I can see why the city has been voted the most beautiful city in the world), Corfu, Iraklion (Crete), Mykonos, Santorini, Napflion, Athens, Izmir, Ephesus, Dubrovnik & Split.

So many experiences to talk about that it'll take a while before I get to putting this together. I can imagine it'll be a couple of weeks before I get onto writing it. Meanwhile, I thought it might be good to chart on a map places we've visited so far since we started exploring the endless wonders of the world.

Paris & Roland Garros

Our third trip to Paris in two years. We visited to attend the French Open (Roland Garros 2010). This is the third Grand Slam we have been to and we now have to go to Flushing Meadows in New York to cap off the last Tennis Grand Slam that we haven't visited. 

We travelled straight from the airport to our hotel and then straight to Roland Garros the day we arrived in Paris. We were both very very tired having caught our flight at 6am which meant having to wake up before 3am. I think it was about mid-way during the final match for the day that we got so tired we headed back to the Hotel. We saw a couple of matches on Court One and some of the outdoor courts. Our tickets were for Court One and we saw a couple of matches including the match between Juan Carlos Ferrero vs. Robby Ginepri. Robby Ginepri won in straight sets.

Having visited Paris previously we still visited the main attractions but also went to a few parks/gardens including the Jardin de Tuileries where we walked from the entrance facing the Lourve all the way to the exit at Concorde at Champs de Elysee. We also visited the Jardin de Lumberbourg. Other places we ventured to included the Napoleon's Tomb,  Army Musuem and the location of the Statue of Liberty.

                          

On one of the evenings we saw the famous Moulin Rouge and it was an experience. The show was good but the seating arrangements were pretty stupid considering 50% of the seats have the back to the stage due to the configuration for people dining as well. You get some free champagne with certain tickets. 

We visited a number of restaurants around Grand Boulevard for dinner and the busiest one was called Chartier. There was a queue onto the footpath and so we decided to return the next night just after 6pm when there was no crowd to try the restaurant. Its an old established and recommended restaurant in Paris which opened in 1896. Scores and scores of reviews about how good it is. Its a typical old french bistro serving mainly french fries and steak (or chicken). I order a pork chop with spaghetti and Kat had steak and frites. I can tell you the unfortunate review of this place was a thumbs down. The meat had no taste nor did the spaghetti. It was like chewing boiled meat. I honestly didn't see what all the fuss was about...but hey each to their own.

Still we tried a few other restaurants which were good.. can't remember the names but they served nice hearty meals. We went back to St. Michels as well to have greek giros....mmmmm that was nice... real tasty meat with chilli sauce.. YUM!

I think thats all and so until our next trip... its a big one as we take a 2 week cruise from Venice to Greece, Turkey & Croatia!

Kat & Will.