Holy Lands Cruise - Crete

Today was mostly a sea day with a late visit to Crete.  The original schedule had us in Crete from noon until 7pm, but with our late start to the cruise, the new arrival time was 3pm, and departing at midnight.
Our morning was filled with a second lecture by Dr Maier.  It is amazing to listen to him speak.  He gets started on one topic and speaks for 45+ minutes without any notes.  He includes some interesting humor as well.  For example when he noticed that he had strayed a little off topic (but still very interesting!) he would stop and comment "Guess I just went down the rabbit hole!". His main topic today was how Jesus and other New Testament figures are mentioned in various non Biblical Roman and Jewish documents.  He also elaborated on how Luke drops in many facts that let historians tie Jesus' timeline to the Roman one.  This lets us know with a high degree of certainty that Jesus' ministry started in 29 AD. Overall a very intriguing lecture where he showed that Christianity is the easiest religion to defend due to the large amount of collaborating evidence in accepted historical documents.

We had a quiet afternoon, watching the ship approach Crete.  We waited for an hour after it docked to head ashore to avoid waiting in long lines for the bus into town. We did a little shopping, I enjoyed a local brew, and we walked through the market area to what is known as Venetian Harbor. It was a very relaxing time and all we had to do was walk back to the bus stop when we were done.
Mary had an email this evening that her mom fell, possibly breaking her nose.  Her sister Debbie left work to go to the ER and we are waiting further news.  Prayers are much appreciated, it's hard to be far away when something like this happens.
Tomorrow is a sea day with two more lectures as we prepare to visit Israel on Saturday.

LATE UPDATE:  Mary got a call from her sister just before we sailed from Crete, and her mom is doing OK.  A broken nose, nothing internal.  She has been discharged and is back at her assisted living facility.  We are praying for no more falls!