July 4

Since our independence day isn't a holiday in Turkey we almost forgot about it.  We had docked in Kusadasi, Turkey.  We had a pre arranged private tour through our travel agent and 10 of us went in a mini bus to Ephesus, ancient ruins 5000 years old with extensive Greek & Roman structures from 4th century bc to 4th century ad.  Ephesus is always crowed but we started at the lower end where most tours finish.  all of us had visited here before so we skipped the usual areas and concentrated on the terrace houses which have only been available to the public from 2006.  Restoration is still in progress bur we saw quite a bit.  It was hot and most of the group wanted to return to the ship instead of visiting a small village.  We got back for a late lunch and Pat & I walked into Kusadasi and explored the bazaar.  It's a fun place to visit but you sure do get hounded by every shop keeper.  There are a lot of leather shops and when we said we were from Florida they understood we wouldn't be interested in leather jackets.  There were a lot of carpet stores with beautiful carpets and we didn't linger to look because it would take a long time to break away.  There was a pool deck sail away party with the band playing patriotic American music in celebration of our Independence day.  No fireworks however.  We met up with out travel agent group for cocktails and a meet & greet and then 7 of us had a table for dinner.  It was a very pleasant day.