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| Messina Cathedral at the top of the hill |
Good afternoon from beautiful Sicily, Italy! Such a beautiful Italian city. It’s a little chilly but the sun and walking around made for a pleasant day. We walked over to the Piazza to see the Messina Cathedral and the Fontana de Orion, a 16th century fountain. Unfortunately, the fountain was under construction so mostly boarded up.
We were able to walk all around the outside and view the beautiful Messina Cathedral. The Cathedral has the largest mechanical clock in the world. It’s an astronomical clock and bell tower. At noon the rooster crows, the lion roars and bells ring lasting 12 minutes.
Just our luck, that was under construction as well. We did hear the bells from the Church for several minutes. I am sure it would be exciting to watch. There were several cute shops around and Italian eateries. We enjoyed our short walk through town.
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| This little boy could really play. He was cute. |
It’s so nice to finally be on the ship. It was such a horrible day when we arrived. The long flights went smoothly but the multiple security checks at the airports and then getting to our hotel made for very long day. We arrived at the hotel around 9 pm and picked up our FedEx at the front desk. This contained our new Google Fi cards.
We spent no less than 2 hours trying to get them connected. Spent a while with tech support and for all intents and purposes, they should have worked but to no avail. We decided to give up and wait until we arrived in Italy (where we are today) and try again. The gentleman at tech support suggested the same. We went to bed around 1:00 am.
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| Zampogna – Italian bagpipes |
Our bus didn’t pick us up until noon so sleeping in was an option. However, we knew we wanted to get a good start on the day so set the alarm for 8 am anyway. Just as we are falling asleep, it sounded as if someone was moving furniture on the floor directly above us. That horrible, screeching noise as the legs of a table or chair scrapes against the floor.
After about 15 minutes of non-stop screeching, Chuck called the front desk. It appears a delivery came in and they were setting up the furniture. Chuck politely asked them to stop.
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| Fontana de Orion (under Construction) |
We gave them about 15 minutes more and no stopping so he called them again with a little more sternness in his voice! The guy at the front desk said he told them.
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| Astronomical clock. The little characters dance and music plays during certain times of the day. |
I was proud of Chuck for not adding any choice words to the conversation but he wasn’t too happy. At 2:15 am and no sleep and no chance of the screeching stopping, once again, Chuck is on the phone with them. Literally yelling. He basically told them to stop now! I, on the
other hand had a better idea. I got up and picked up a blanket and a pillow and trotted downstairs and laid on the beautiful white couch in front of the reception desk.
The gentlemen came over and asked if he could help me. I said why yes you can. You can tell them to stop moving the furniture so we can get some sleep or I was sleeping here on the couch. He said he told them. I said, OK. I’m sleeping here tonight because they aren’t stopping. By that time, the men moving the furniture came out and said they were stopping.
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| A close up of the astronomy signs on the clock. |
So, I told him I would be back and not moving at all if he didn’t.
What are they going to do? Multiple bad reviews on several travel sites they are so proud to use such as TripAdvisor and Hotels.com where we booked. When we checked out they were going to charge us for the two bottles of water we had in the room and Chuck almost bit her head off.
She was nice enough not to charge us. The lack of sleep and the whole travel day gave me a migraine so my night on the ship was spent in bed.
Back to the Sim cards for the phone. I was able to get it to work by setting the carrier manually instead of it letting it choose a carrier. That made us so happy!!! The one part that doesn’t work and we are very disappointed in is the
hotspot.
What this means for me is I cant post from my laptop. This means only pictures from my phone can be uploaded. I’ll do my best and we’ll see what happens. Right now, I’m using a local Sim card we bought in the Canary Islands Spain that was still good. It should still work when we arrive in Greece but may not in Dubai. We’ll do the best we can but my pictures may be limited for now so bear with me.
Christmas decorations have arrived on the ship and the towns are decorating as well. Its nice to see and they are so beautiful to look at.
Much love to all and may God bless you always!
Chuck & Lea Ann
WorldTravelReynolds 