After spending a couple of days in Istanbul, my wife and I were invited to board the Oceania’s Riviera for a 10 night cruise.

The first two nights we stayed at the Sultania, a nice little hotel with an excellent location from where to explore Istanbul. We had a ’tasti’ dinner at Sehe the first night, and an even better one (seafood this time) the next night at Balıkçı Sabahattin.

Some photos here.

But we were there for the cruise, so as soon as we could, we boarded the ship.

The cruise ship is perfect in every way (here are some photos), from the large staterooms, to the decor, art, service… but it excels above any and all other cruises in one thing: the food. It’s, as they say, “the finest cuisine at sea”.

Our cruise took us to:

  • Lesbos, where we could not disembark due to strong winds. Photos.
  • Ephesus-Kuşadası Photos.
  • Bodrum, super beautiful port town, where we visited The Bodrum Castle of The Knights of St. John Underwater Archeology museum. Photos
  • Antalaya, another really pretty port town. Photos.
  • Limassol, where we did not disembark since we had too much work (but we did enjoy the amazing cuisine on board).
  • Rhodes, where again we did not disembark because we had to work, but we enjoyed the food, lecture and karaoke. Photos.
  • Crete, where we went to Elounda for a walk on the beach, and then to inspect a couple of properties: the Blue Palace, and the Domes of Elounda. Photos
  • Santorini, where we joined some Oceania executives on a tour to Santo wines, the Industrial Tomato Museum, and had a great lunch at Salty Bone before a stroll around Thyra (and a huge line to get back to the ship via the cable car). An amazing awesome extra was the “market dinner” at the buffet onboard. It was really good and legit Greek food. Photos.
  • Mykonos, where again we could not disembark due to strong winds, so we enjoyed our huge balcony and excellent food. Photos.

We spent one extra night in Athens (Photos), at the Radisson Blue Park, basically working all day (except for a nice dinner at Ατίταμος), flying back to Spain the next morning. Some nice home cooked and local food options at Flo Cafe in the airport (after security) by the way.

The crazy thing? We’re coming back to cruise the Aegean in a week!