Thinking of booking a cruise of the Greek Isles that leaves from Athens? If so, you should plan to arrive a day before the ship departs from Piraeus port for a couple of reasons. Most importantly, you don’t want to miss the ship, due to unforeseen circumstances, like a flight delay or cancellation. And you don’t want to miss experiencing the high points of this amazing ancient city.

Serendipity: the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way.

What were the chances… “You’re going to Santorini when?” My husband and I had booked our Windstar cruise of the Greek Isles and two weeks before we were to leave, I found out that a couple from my hometown — very good friends that I’d known most of my life — were going to be staying on Santorini the same week we would be visiting from our ship.

“Stow Away,” my article on a Star Clippers Mediterranean cruise, published in the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram, received Finalist honors in the 2015 Awards Competition of the North American Travel Journalists Association (NATJA). The category was Special Focus Travel Articles – Print: Cruises. The cruise departed from Mallorca, one of the Balearic Islands off the coast …

The travel bug bit Anne McAlpin at age 16, when she spent six weeks cycling through Europe. It was her first experience with overpacking, as she and…