Okay, pay attention. You’ll need to concentrate for this. I’m living it, and I have completely lost track, so this is for my benefit as well as yours! I’m hoping if I write it down it will (a) make more sense and (b) stay in my head. But don’t count on it.

So, the middle bit of the cruise was expected to be:

20^th – Venice

21^st – Ravenna, Italy

22^nd – Split, Croatia

23^rd – Kotor, Montenegro

24^th – Corfu, Greece

Yes, five ports in five days. Yikes. We were dreading it. The most I have ever, personally, done is three ports in three days, and that was pretty exhausting, so five in five was never going to be particularly welcome. Last time, mum had the buggy. Now she uses a manual wheelchair for long distances, which means Dad and I have to push. It’s amazing, but just when you think you cannot possibly attain a higher level of exhaustion, another one inevitably appears. Let’s summarise by saying I was expecting to sleep well…

Anyway, after Corigliano, the Captain made an announcement that, due to the port being closed by fog, we would not be going to Venice, but to Trieste instead. Which we duly did.

Trieste, Italy (on the border with Slovenia)

What an absolutely lovely place. Even though the sky was grey and the temperature (18 C) low enough to warrant long sleeves for the first time since the Bay of Biscay a week ago, we had a lovely time here.  The whole place was built by someone with a love of that slightly florid stone architecture that the people of the 1800s and 1900s so enjoyed. Almost every building was stunningly beautiful.

And the dipped kerbs were unobstructed, which was nice for me!

The over-enthusiasm of the ornate architecture continued in the naming of some of the places in the town – the Grand Canal is neither Grand, nor a Canal. It’s an inlet that runs two blocks inland (enough to put some cafes down each side and some very small boats on the water that can only get under the bridges at low tide), but it’s very pleasant, despite its seriously overegged advertising/nomenclature. And we ate proper Italian ice cream (well, Dad and I did), which was a definite perk to the visit.

Back on board, things got complicated. Try and keep up. The general gist of the announcements were that there is a nasty low in the western Med, heading north (very unusual for this time of year). Therefore, we need to head south, and pretty sharpish, in order to avoid a very nasty few days on the ocean wave. So, instead of Ravenna, Split, Kotor, Corfu, we will be doing:

20th – Trieste

21^st – Split

22^nd – Corfu

23^rd and 24th – Catania (two days) (where?!)

1.5 sea days

26^th – Cartagena (half day)

So, today was Split, instead of tomorrow. Tomorrow is Corfu, instead of Tuesday. It’ll be interesting to see how Christian it is, because we are now arriving in a place that is now Greece on a Sunday.

Still with me? Good, you can explain it to me. I’m just trying to keep the upcoming 24 hours in my head. My brain cannot cope with the rest. I’m way too tired to have to think this hard! I’m supposed to be on holiday, dammit!