Previous Day (Priene, Didyma & Miletus)
Destination: Greece & Turkey
Duration: 18 Days 17 Nights (Aug 06~Aug 23, 2012)
Day 8: Kusadasi –> Izmir –> Mykonos
This day was basically a “Transit day” – we went to the
main bazaar for some last minute souvenir purchase before getting transferred to
Izmir Alsancak Port for our 8D7N Greek Islands Cruise with Costa Atlantica.
Costa Atlantica, an Italian Cruise Ship – as quoted by their website is “a ship
in which you will want to lose yourself. Admiring, reflecting and enjoying all
the surprises and absorbing atmospheres, colours and extraordinary environments
that make it so unique.”
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| Last Breakfast @ Kusadasi |
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| Goodbye Kusadasi |
The driver seemed to be having problem locating the port
and had to ask other driver (from the car during a red light) for direction. I
guess not many people had transfer to Alsancak Port from Kusadasi.
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| Artaturk @Izmir |
When we arrived at the port, we did not see any Costa
Atlantica crew at the terminal at all. This surprised us as we though they
should at least had some crews there to help on embarkation process. I guess
either:-
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We were too early
-
Izmir was not a major embarkation port for this
Cruise (Rhodes & Crete were the main port of embarkation)
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| Izmir Alsancak Port Terminal |
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| Inside the Terminal |
We showed the custom officers our cruise e-tickets and asked
them on the embarkation procedure and this was when another group of people
came in for Costa as well. The custom officers took our passports and checked
for quite a while – I guess we might be the first few Malaysians trying to
board a cruise ship at Izmir. We asked about the luggage service as it was written
in the ticket that someone would help us to take our luggage to our cabin but
the officers there knew nothing about it. They finally let us pass the custom
to walk to Costa Atlantica with our luggage and oh mine, the ship was huge and
looked so glorious with all its glass balconies.
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| Finally got in... |
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| Walking toward Costa Atlantica |
There were 2 entrances to the ship – the central entrance
and the forward entrance. We reached the central entrance first but the crews
there waved us to continue to walk to the forward entrance. So we continued to
walk to the forward entrance with our luggage under the hot sun and queued up
at the forward entrance as there were another group of people queuing in front.
After like 15 minutes, we finally showed the crews there our e-tickets, this
was when the crews told us: “this is the crew entrance, you have to get to the
central guest entrance!”
We were like HUH?! So we dragged our luggage under the
hot sun to the central entrance again to show the crew there our e-tickets and
the lady there kept insisting that we need to go back to the forward crew
entrance. This was when the guy beside her told her: “They are passengers!” I still
remembered her reaction when she realized her mistake, her eyes almost popped
out and she closed her mouth with both her hand – then her voice made a 180
degree turn and kept addressing us as “Madam” and “Sir”. While I was really
flattered that I looked to be qualified to be a Costa crew, it was definitely
NOT FUN to drag our luggage around under the hot sun for such a long time. There
was still no luggage service as we had to drag our luggage up to the central
entrance stairs! They kept our passports as well as it was the procedure in
Izmir port.
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| Beautiful! |
We were told that our Costa Card (basically our ‘magic
card’ for entire cruise) would be there waiting for us in our cabin thus we
proceeded to our cabin ourselves – cabin 5146. It was a cabin with balcony but obstructed
view. As our luck had it, we had the worst obstructed view out of all the room
of the same class. On each side of the ship, there were 3 lifeboats with
greater height than others and our room was right in the middle of one. What
were the odds that we got 1 of the 6 rooms with this VERY obstructed view. *facepalm* Well I guess the only consolation
was we were paying a discounted price for the room which was offered by http://www.allcruisesfromturkey.com/.
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| The Corridor to Cabin 5146 |
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| The Bathroom |
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| Cabin 5146 |
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| Another View of Cabin 5146 |
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| Our VERY Obstructed Balcony View! |
Another misfortune – there were no Costa card waiting for
us in our cabin! We had to get the card
from the cruise lobby, our original cards only arrived in our room an hour
later. After that, we’d decided to explore around the cruise. The interior of
the cruise looked like the movie Titanic. It was definitely impressive! We headed
to the Botticelli buffet restaurant for some late lunch – the restaurant was huge and jam-packed
with people!
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| The Lobby @2nd Floor |
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| Our Costa Cards |
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| At Deck 10 |
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| Picture taken from the Top of Cruise Ship |
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| The Central Section of Costa Atlantica from 9th floor Buffet Restaurant |
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| The Glass Roof of Central Section |
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| There is a Glass Stairs between 9th and 10th floor as well |
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| Well, it's an Italian Cruise Ship so there must be Italian Pizza! |
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| The Ice Cream is the BEST!!! We love it so much! |
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| Some of the Lunch selections |
We then explored more areas before attending the safety
briefing and had a kitchen tour with our English speaking hostess Elizabeth. Anyway
we were basically the few Asians on board – during the entire 8D7N cruise, we’d
only managed to see another 2 Asian couples. Costa Atlantica departed from
Izmir port and headed to Mykonos at 6pm this day and we took some photos from
the deck.
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| The Caruso Theatre |
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| A Quiet section at Deck 1 |
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| Sammy was there! |
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| The Florian Cafe |
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| The Shops |
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| The Bar near Lobby |
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| It truly looks amazing... |
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| That's the lift! |
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| Shot from the bottom |
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| Cafe just outside Tiziano Restaurant |
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| Our English Speaking Hostess |
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| The Casino |
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| More Casino |
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| Kitchen of Tiziano Restaurant |
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| Oh Hello! |
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| Interactive Kiosk |
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| At Cabin 5146 Balcony, No I'm not going to jump! Just want to have a better view! |
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| Leaving Izmir Port, Look at the Seagulls following us! |
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| A Panoramic View |
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| Another View of Costa Atlantica Leaving Izmir |
There were 2 options for dinner (inclusive in the price
unless you want to pay additional) – fine dining or buffet. Since this was our
1st night on the cruise, we’d decided to dine in Tiziano for the
fine dining. There were bruschetta, breadsticks (grissini) and various types of
bread on the table along with bottles of balsamic vinegar and olive oil.
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| Bruschetta! |
We chose “Raw ham & Melon” and “Surimi & Maid
Pudding” as our appetizers and also tried out their vegetable soup. The Raw ham
was very salty but blended well with the sweet melon. The pudding was a bit
strange though. Soup was not good as it was too salty.
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| A piece of Art |
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| Lovely Presentation |
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| Vegetable Soup |
We also had “Spaghetti Pasta with garlic, oil and red
chili pepper” since we were in an Italian cruise ship, pasta was a must try
right? The Pasta was marvelous as we expected!
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| Wonderful Pasta with generous serving of Parmesan |
Halfway into our dinner, 'That's amore' was played and
the atmosphere was simple electrifying, we could see some people started to
dance! Wow! Just like in the movie! I felt so blessed to be here.
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| Let's Dance! |
For main course, we chose “salted cod fish fillet served
with vegetable ratatouille and potatoes mousse” and “Grilled young rooster
served with mashed potatoes and vegetable ratatouille”. The chicken was average
and the fish was over salty again. I wondered whether the chef had mistaken
salt for something else that night.
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| The Chicken Set |
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| Cod Fish Set |
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| The Salad |
Desserts were traditional Neapolitan cake and “baba al
rum with fruit salad and zabaione sauce”. Cake was ordinary but the “baba al
rum” was special – basically it was a kind of cake drenched with liquor, yummy!
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| Baba al Rum |
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| Neapolitan Cake |
When we went back to our cabin, we noticed that the cabin
steward had arranged our room and delivered our “TODAY” newsletter. “TODAY” was
basically a newsletter on what is happening next day, it would be delivered the
night before so that the passenger could plan. There were port arrival &
depart timing information, show and party information and meal information as
well. We kept all the “TODAY” newsletters as reminder of our cruise at the end.
=)
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| A Ribbon! |
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| TODAY Newsletter! |
We also
went to the theater to watch their live show and it was definitely
entertaining. The cruise itself was like a floating castle that never sleeps!
They also provide supper as well but we did not go try it out as we were too
looking forward to our Mykonos trip tomorrow.
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| Theatre at Night |
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| Dance Dance Dance |
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| More Dance! |
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| Pool Deck at Night |
Masterpost (Click this to get to day by day link)
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