Susan's NGTAW Blog: Sailing on the Sea Cloud - the Adriatic from Dubrovnik to Athens

Sunday, July 3, 2022

Sailing on the Sea Cloud - the Adriatic from Dubrovnik to Athens

Our sailing vessel, the Sea Cloud (stock photo)

Our trip itinerary - 12 days, 10 ports, 4 countries

Thursday, June 30 - Trip Day 1

We're heading out on a sailing adventure. With a little trepidation, as this voyage has been four years in planning. We're pleased to be on another National Geographic trip, this time paired with their sailing partners, Lindblad. We booked this trip in 2018, to travel in 2019 but had to change at the last minute - to rebook for 2020. Well, of course, Covid intervened - and here we are in July 2022, ready to roll. We'll be on the vessel for 12 days, visiting 9 ports and 4 countries.

We headed for O'Hare from Middleton today, after celebrating littlest Grandson's birthday the night before. He will officially be a 3 year old on Saturday. Because it wasn't really his actual birthday, all the brothers asked if they could have candles on their cupcakes to blow out as well. Of course, why not?

Almost at O'Hare airport - but no parking in the extended day lots - yikes!

Always important to remember where you park at ORD - especially after 2 weeks away!

Happy travelers on another adventure

We're heading out 2 days early, to guard against cancellations and delays. The news had been full of problems with the airlines, and we had our own experiences with them on our Holland trip and my travels for graduation speeches. After two unplanned airport hotel nights, I hope we've paid our dues.

We're flying Austrian Airlines, with a stopover in Vienna, to arrive in Dubrovnik on Friday. The Austrian Airlines business class is interesting - reminds me more of being in a car than on an airplane. But fully flat beds and all the fancy stuff. We departed as planned at 4:20 PM, without a hitch, except I lost my hair products to TSA because I forgot about the liquid size limits.