Dubrovnik

It was another beautiful day as we sailed into Dubrovnik.We caught a taxi with another couple, to the top of the hill which overlooked the old town, the walled part of the city in Dubrovnik. ( You can see this beautiful city on the t.v. program "Missing" currently showing on tv).Dubrovnik is an incredibly beautiful city. It was immaculately clean.Very close buildings and lots of little alleyways and walkways. Nice thing too is there were no cars (couldn't get one up the narrow alleyways)

We chatted to the waitress where we had lunch and she said everyone learns English, but to get a job most people needed to be multi lingual. The girl spoke 6 languages and was learning more! Amazing, and here we are an we only speak one!

We walked back to the boat which took about an hour, but we saw a bit of the town and the waterfront. Lots of big(private yachts) and boats in town!

Corfu

What a lovely place is Corfu. It is part of Greece and this is a beautiful city. We went ashore and wandered around the miriade of streets...got lost a couple of times but as it is not too big we managed to get ourselves back to the ship before it left without us. It was very warm this day, and many people were in swimming at the many beaches that were around the peninsula of Corfu.There was this fort on the end of the peninsula, and boats were moored up inside of the wall and the mainland.

The Jewish quarter was filled with lovely jewellery shops and shops selling kumquat liquor and lemoncello. The synagog was very beautiful, and is quite a landmark to look for.

Journal

I did this in my art journal the other night. The page was covered with gesso and then spayed with Adirondack colour wash. Stamped with a roller stamp from stampin up ( dots) and then stamped shapes and words were coloured using water colour crayons by MUNGYO (Gallery). These are fabulous crayons that you can either colour the page with the crayon and then apply water to get a watercolour effect or use a water pen and just dab that onto the coloured crayon and paint the picture like you would with paint. So easy and you can go over the colour until you get the depth of shading you want. Finally I experimented ith the same back ground stamp (face) using silver embossing powder. It probably is a bit much, though it does not look too bad. I think the fact that the light is shining off it in the picture tends to make it look like it is overwhelming the page. Still things to learn and it is all about trial and error

Altered Canvas

 I just love this sort of thing. It is so messy and so much fun. I think it brings out the child in me. ...here is another canvas I made for my daughter. I used old sewing notions like hooks and eyes, domes, buckles an old earring ( the huge thing onthe bottom right of the picture! yes that was a earring I wore in the 80's)flowers and anything else I could find including beads. All finished off with glimmer mist. I think that the inspiration comes from a course the ladies at Scotties did at the recent CHA in USA with Anna Dubrowski  http://tworzysko.blogspot.co.nz/ .Boy there are some very talented people out there.

SENZ altered canvas

Altered Canvas

I have just been to the NZ crafting show called SENZ, and I did a couple of classes. One of them was with Bev from Scottie crafts and altered canvas. There was much sticking, gluing spraying and general funwith gesso and texture paste. The other bits and pieces were all plonked onto the canvas and "hey presto" you're finished. You could put as much or as little as you wanted. Everyone had a choice of either green, pink or blue and they all turned out differently, but were all fabulous

Wet afternoon doodlings

What better than having a wet winters day to spend the time playing. I have had two days scrapbooking and thought that i would try and do some altered art. I am inspired by ladies such as Roben Marie Smith http://www.robenmarie.com/blog and DinaWakley  http://dinastamps.typepad.com I thought that I would start an art journal. I love to play with stamps and other mediums so I hope to try a different technique each page and develope my own style as I go along.
Here are the two pages I did today.

Katakolon- Greece

We continue our way around the Greek Isles and today we are in the little port of Katakolon, access to Olympia. We caught a local bus out to Olympia and spent time in the museum.It was astounding and the size of some of the marble statues is staggering as you can imagine how big they all must have been when they were once complete. The relics were amazing and it was so interesting to see the masks and cooking utensils, tools and other things found in the excavations.

The Olympia grounds were very serene and peaceful and it was exciting  and awe inspiring to be in the place where it all started those many years ago.
 
and ..........the original starting blocks in the stadium are still there .

TheThese pretty little tables and chairs seem to sum up the pretty port of Katakolon.They were a joy to see and so nice to see the individuality of who ever created this. It really tickled the artist side of me.

Nafplion- Greece

When we got up this morning we were sailing into another beautiful harbour with clear blue sky and sparkling blue sea .Today we are in the Greek township of  Nafplion.

We climbed the 1000 steps to the top of the Palamidi fortress.You can just make out the stairs  to the mid to right of the picture. It was hot, hard work but really worth it for the views across the bay that were spectacular. Once you get to the top you have to pay to go into the grounds of the fortress, (which some people did not know this and were a bit miffed that they had walked all the way up to pay to go another 200 steps into the fortress; but hey this is Greece and they need everything they can get)

The pretty streets of the old town area have rambling bouganvillia around windows and doors and the streets are so pretty. I really enjoyed this little port and would love to come back someday.

Messina, Sicily

We arrived in port at 8am. We did not have an organised tour for today, so just wandered around the little streets and visited the churches and so on. This was a sleepy little town except for the drivers. I have written in my diary that this is the first place so far where the pedestrians take their lives in their own hands when they cross the roads. The cars give way to NO ONE! Crazy, and you can tell as so many of the cars have dents and scrapes.

A local metal craftsman was making these bell wheels. You turned the handle and the wheel went around and the bells rang making a lovely wind chime type of noise. They were a really neat piece of art and if they had not been so heavy I would have purchased one for the garden at home.

Colourful local produce, always provides a wonderful photo opportunity.

The beautiful tiled floors in the church down by the port. As with so many European churches the floors are just as beautiful as the walls and ceilings.
 Leaving the port of Messina. It was again another beautiful day and sailing out was spectacular, celebrated by cocktails on the deck.

Amalfi-

Continuing down the coast literally, on the windy narrow roads ( and what skill those bus drivers have) we made our way through Positano and to Amalfi. The buses can only go into Amalfi one way and out another way as some time ago a bus got stuck manoeuvering and had to be airlifted out by helicopter!

The views would be spectacular I'm sure if the sun was shining. It was pretty amazing anyway. The houses and roads a perched on the edge of these great rocky cliffs.

Sorry pictures aren't great as taken from the bus and with the weather being poor visability was not good.

Amalfi Coast- Sorrento

Overnight we made our way down the coast to Naples. Here we got onto one of the ship organised bus trips and travelled along the precarious roads toSorrento, Positino and Amalfi coast. What a shame the weather has turned bad and it rained all the way from Sorrento to Amalfi and back. It would have been utterly stunning views otherwise

We looked down over a bridge to see what once must have been a house down in the gully.Look how high the wall is on the right. Quite a lovely site

We wandered around Sorrento and there were lots of lovely flowers every where. It is such a pretty little town. Hubby thought he would like to come back here for a longer stay....perhaps when the weather is a little better eh.

Civitavecchia

From florence we sailed to Civitavecchia (Port to get to Rome).As we are stopping in Rome after the cruise we went ashore and walked around the town. It was a Sunday so most things were shut. Glorious day though and a pretty port. Locals were out and sunning themselves on the little rocky beaches along the shore.

I  purchased some cakes for a nibble it seems that they are treated like  little treasures. The lady wrapped them up like a gift, and they were gorgeous to eat too.

Florence

Florence is one of my favourite places. We arrived in port of Civitavecchia and travelled by bus to the city-1 1/2 hour drive away. Florence was very crowded as it was the weekend and a local feastival was on. The police also had some sort of parade going on.

That famous bridge (Ponte Vecchio) was crowed with people and jewels! Purchase a fabulous tailored leather jacket from one of the shops on the bridge.

As with everywhere we went the gelato was amazing and the huge displays were very impressive. Love the doughnuts in the front jus to temp you  a bit more.The street art was incredibleand everywhere. Here is a picture that I loved and really on hindsite should have purchased and rolled it up to bring home.