By Brian Nicol
As my wife and I filed slowly onto tour bus No. 12, a man behind us in line said "If it's Tuesday, this must be Malta." It was, and it was.

The Mediterranean island republic of Malta was the second-to-the-last stop on our 10-day eastern Mediterranean cruise aboard Holland America Line's Noordam. We had begun our voyage outside Rome on a Monday, made stops in resurgent Dubrovnik, Croatia; sun-drenched Corfu, historic Katakolon and wind-swept Santorini, Greece; and busy Kusadasi, Turkey, before floating slowly into the amazing port of Valletta, Malta, eight days later. We were scheduled to stop in Messina, Sicily, on Wednesday then disembark back near Rome on Thursday. Ten days, seven ports, five countries. No wonder the man behind us was weary.

By that Tuesday in Malta, all 1,918 of us Noordam passengers were slowing down a bit. But it was a satisfied slowdown that comes from knowing we were nearing the end of a wonderful voyage, for many of us a trip of a lifetime. The ship was our floating luxury hotel, and the ports of call were the stars. It was them we came to see, and they didn't disappoint. For my wife and me, the two brightest of the seven ports were the Greek island of Santorini and our Tuesday stop, Malta.

Villages of Snow
About halfway into our 12-hour stay on Santorini, we were perched on a windy wall outside the Santos Winery, staring at the sea below and the white, cliff-clinging villages in the distance. We were savoring the moment, enjoying one of the most spectacular views anywhere.

When the Noordam eased into Santorini's crescent harbor earlier that morning, we had looked at those same limestone villages sprinkled high up on the steep cliffs and mistaken them for snow-even in the Mediterranean in summer. They weren't, of course, but now from our winery vantage point, they still looked like snow.

Our Essence of Santorini shore excursion had begun with a white-knuckle bus ride up the switchback road from the harbor. On the way, we learned that crescent-shaped Santorini is merely an arc of the mostly submerged rim of a giant volcano. In 1450 B.C., the volcanic island of Thira exploded in one of the most cataclysmic eruptions ever, leaving behind only Santorini and its neighbor isles. Some legends claim Thira was home to the lost city of Atlantis.

By mid-afternoon, our exploration of the island's legends and essence took us to Firi, its largest village. We walked up and down its winding streets, alleyways and stairways, stopping to browse the shops, sample the foods and-instinctively-stare out at the view.

After dinner at Zafora, a small restaurant perched on one of the highest points in the village, we chose the teleferic (cable car) rather than a donkey ride to get us back down the cliff to the harbor.
An hour or so later, we sat on our stateroom's veranda as the ship weighed anchor and pulled slowly out to sea, taking us away from the snow villages and on to another landfall adventure.

City of Knights
Valletta, Malta, is a fortress city built by the Order of the Knights of St. John in the late 16th century after they had successfully repulsed an invading force of more than 40,000 Ottoman Turks. The walled city would protect their island against the Mediterranean's never-ending clashes of cultures.
For us on our Tuesday visit, a look at the city would come later in the day. First, we traveled by bus to a glass-blowing factory, a pottery workshop, a winery and finally to Marsaxlokk, a fishing village noted for its brightly painted fishing boats, called luzzu (light).

Later, we strolled on our own down Valletta's Republic Street, the city's commercial, cultural spine. We didn't want to leave Malta without seeing St. John's Co-Cathedral, the country's spiritual and historical center, a magnificent repository of art and heritage.

The cathedral is dedicated to St. John the Baptist, the order's patron saint. From the outside, the stone structure is stocky, plain and severe. Inside, it is a breathtaking, radiant celebration of baroque flamboyance; colorful works of art and sculpture grace every side chapel and altar.

The cathedral's sanctuary features a sculpture by Giuseppe Mazzuoli depicting the baptism of Christ by John the Baptist. In the cathedral's oratory hang two of the most renowned paintings of the Renaissance, Caravaggio's The Beheading of St. John the Baptist and his St. Jerome.

What's most amazing about the cathedral isn't its walls or ceiling, but its floor: nothing but inlaid marble slabs, hundreds of them, each uniquely decorated with a colorful coat of arms. Beneath each marble slab lie the remains of an honorable knight  of St. John.

We could have spent hours learning more about the knights and their church, but a cruise ship waits for no man or woman. We made our way down Valletta's stair streets to the harbor below, with time to spare before the gangplank was raised.

Other Port Moments
The white walls and marble streets of Dubrovnik on Croatia's Adriatic coastline have seen more than their share of conflict and conquest, most recently in the early 1990s, when the Serbs bombed and shelled the city relentlessly.

Maria, our guide for our Historic Dubrovnik shore excursion, described those awful days in a few chilling sentences: "I was 10 years old. I was lying in bed, counting the bombs as they exploded. The sky was red with fire."

During our shore excursion on the famed Greek isle of Corfu, we visited the 18th-century Greek Orthodox Monastery of the Virgin Mary, prominent on a hilltop above the resort area of Paleokastritsa. After our monastery tour, as we relaxed at a nearby cafe, one of the monks walked over to take a break of his own. He seemed as old as the monastery itself-bearded, long-haired, dressed in a drab, flowing robe-a figure right out of the Middle Ages. He sat down, looked over at my wife, winked and lit up a cigarette.

At ancient Olympia, about 25 miles inland from the Peloponnesian harbor town of Katakolon, we walked the ruins of the sacred site of the original Olympic Games, held from the eighth century B.C. until the fourth century. I stood at one of the 20 stone starting blocks in the open-air Olympic stadium, ready to run, imagining more than 40,000 Greeks cheering. I didn't stand there naked, however, like those Greek athletes did so many centuries ago.

Turkey is famous for its Oriental rugs, of course, and its historic port city Kusadasi has more than its share. After a long, hot day seeing the sites and fighting off the shopkeepers and rug merchants, we relaxed on the Noordam's pool deck with Gus and Bev Maersk-Moller, veteran cruisers and travelers from Sacramento, Calif. When I mentioned the aggressive sales tactics of the street merchants, Gus deadpanned, "Yeah, I bought two rugs just to get away from them."

Messina, the Sicilian city closest to mainland Italy, was our final port of call. It was also the dirtiest, noisiest and most chaotic. Graffiti adorns every wall; motor scooters ignore every law; beggars harass every tourist. Yet none of this intimidated us. In fact, we kind of enjoyed it. After all, we were seasoned Mediterranean seafarers.

Before You Go
For information about Holland America's sailings or to plan a dream Mediterranean cruise, contact AAA.com/travel.