Adriatic & Aegean Sea Cruise: Sometimes you need a vacation from your vacation

Have you ever gone on vacation only to come back exhausted and feel like you need a vacation from your vacation? Traveling is exhausting! We were given some great advice before we left for our trip: make sure to plan some vacations throughout the year during our travels.

At the time this sounded silly. Weren’t we kind of on vacation the whole time? It ended up being some wonderful advice.

After two months of running around, catching trains/buses/planes/boats, checking into countless Airbnb’s/hostels/hotels, planning what to do, where to eat, booking tours, buying tickets… we took the advice of our friends Dave and Amanda.

We took a week long cruise where our main decision everyday was which poolside cocktail we wanted to try.

I actually think this advice can extend to shorter term vacations as well. Taking a day or two to do nothing but relax during a week long trip can definitely help you feel more relaxed on your return home.

The cruise we decided on was the MSC Poesia. Given we are still on a budget, this was slightly more affordable than some of the other options while still stopping in some amazing places.

While we didn’t get off the boat at every stop, we did venture off to find a few beaches here and there.

After all, our whole purpose in taking this trip was to relax and regroup before another three months of running around Europe.

Here was our itinerary:

Day 1: Venice, Italy

Day 2: Bari, Italy

Day 3: Katakolon, Greece (Olympia)

Day 4: Mykonos, Greece

Day 5: Athens, Greece

Day 6: Sarande, Albania

Day 7: Dubrovnik, Croatia

If you’ve never been on a cruise there are tons of activities going on all the time.

We played bingo, watched a show almost every night, hung out at the wine bar, played trivia, worked out in the gym, swam in the pools, checked out books from the library, went to the sushi restaurant, and watched the World Cup games while laying out at the pool.

We also had some wonderful dinner companions during the week we got to know pretty well. This friendly couple was from Argentina and we had some fun figuring out how to communicate with their primary language being Spanish.

Overall, we had a great time. Now onto continue our travels through Eastern Europe, working our way North.

Let us know if you have any recommendations on for any of our locations coming up: Budapest, Vienna, Krakow, Prague, Berlin.