Saturday, October 5, 2013

A Missed Port

Off Kusadasi, Turkey: Kusadasi was supposed to be our port for the afternoon. Our side thrusters were less powerful than the offshore wind so the captain could not edge the ship up to the dock. I don't blame him for not wanting to dent his shiny, new ship.

We've cruised many times, this is only the third time this has happened to us. We weren't able to tender into Cannes on one trip and rough weather kept us out of Greenland on another transit.

Kusadasi is the port from which one accesses the ruins of ancient Ephesus, of Biblical renown. Lucky for us we had an excellent tour of Ephesus on an earlier cruise.

If you haven't seen Ephesus you need to do so. Regardless of how religious you are (I'm not), if your religious heritage is at all Christian you'll find the simple history of Ephesus amazing.

When your guide points to a particular room in what then passed for an Ephesian apartment building and announces that St. Paul lived exactly there two millennia ago, it is a wow! It makes biblical characters into real historical people who ate, slept, scratched flea bites, and had toothaches.