October 29, 2025

You may be wondering why Chongae and I are in Italy after just recently returning from 5 weeks in Seoul, South Korea. Our trip to Seoul was well deserved as Chongae got to visit with her family who all still live in South Korea. As I shared in previous blogs, the best time to travel to Europe is “shoulder season” the times before and after summer when cities are far less crowded and you have a more authentic experience other than the summer tourist season. Our second motive was to experience Oceania’s new cruise ship Vista, which we plan to travel on during a future World Cruise. And the itinerary was outstanding visiting Italy, Greece and Turkey. We plan to end our journey with a week in Istanbul with Chongae’s brother and wife. Now that will be fun!

We flew from Orlando to Rome, but all cruise ships depart from Civitavecchia. For new travelers, plan on a 1 hour drive each way from your ship to and from Rome. Civitavecchia is an easily walkable city with great cuisine. It was the departing port for Italian men going off to sea and a statue still reflects that sentiment.

We embarked in time for dinner, and the Grand Dining Room is a beautiful setting. As I’ve shared before my favorite time of the day is sitting across from my wife at dinner enjoying a good meal together and sharing about our day. On a cruise ship every night can be a date night! Tonight, we ate in one of the specialty restaurants “Red Ginger” which had an amazing 7 course Asian Fusion selection. If this is any indication of what to expect I anticipate smooth sailing ahead!

Thanks for traveling with us.