Day 8: Naples, Italy

Happy Mother's Day!!!!

We woke up around 7:30 and Dad and I headed up to Topsiders to grab food for all of us. The ship was just beginning to pull into the harbor area as we headed upstairs. We caught our first sight of Mt. Vesuvius looming over Naples. Topsiders was surprisingly quiet considering how early everyone's excursions were leaving. Back in the room, we ate out on the verandah to enjoy the views as we pulled alongside the pier. Naples has a beautiful cruise terminal with bus parking located about 30 feet from the gangway. Our excursion meeting time was at 8:30 so we finished getting ready and headed down to Rockin' Bar D, where Katrina was running the excursion process. The excursion operator was the Aloschi Brothers, and I can highly recommend them. They were the best tour operator we have ever encountered. We were assigned to Bus 6 with Shelley, Dennis, and the boys. Our tablemates were on the same excursion, but were on Bus 7. Throughout the excursion, the three boys fought over who get to sit next to me, and proceeded to talk my ear off. But they are cool kids, so I didn't really mind.

We left the port and headed off through Naples on the way to the Amalfi Peninsula. Everyone we had heard from had said that Naples was a big, dirty city that would rob you blind. That about summed it up. Once we turned off the highway and onto the coastal road, things changed. Our route took us down the Sorrento Coast, across the peninsula, and then up the Amalfi Coast. As we started heading down the Sorrento Coast, we got an incredible view of Naples, the Bay of Naples, and even the Magic off in the distance. Every turn brought one incredible view after another, and we weren't even on the Amalfi Coast yet. The roads we were driving on made this quite an adventure. We were driving on a two-lane road that was only one and a half lanes wide, with steep cliffs plunging down to the Mediterranean on the right. The roads are so narrow, that one time, a German tour company tried using a full size bus, and it got stuck. They had to slice the bus into two pieces to remove it. That is how tight these roads are. All along the coast, you can see where buses have taken chunks out of buildings, and even taken out a few balconies.

Just outside of Sorrento, we stopped in a woodworking factory that has been operating for hundreds of years. The stuff was absolutely beautiful, but the prices were outrageous. They did give us free drinks and snacks, so I really didn't mind the stop. We continued on through Sorrento and the lemon groves, and then made our turn to head across the peninsula towards the Amalfi Coast. As we started heading down the Amalfi Coast, the views became even more incredible. Words and pictures combined cannot describe how beautiful this area is. We continued winding along the narrow roads for about 45 minutes, before making another stop in the coastal village of Amalfi. We were given an hour of free time to explore. Even though lunch was coming up, we were all really hungry so we stopped by a pizzeria (couldn't pass up Italian pizza), and ate in the town square. It was a Sunday, so the church bells were ringing and everyone was coming and going from the beautiful cathedral. The whole town was set right between the mountains and the Mediterranean, just incredible. We took a stroll through the streets, checked out the beach, and then headed back to the bus. Several of the restaurants had signs in English, but they hadn't gotten it quite right. For example, one restaurant offered "local typical food." That certainly sounds like a winner.

Back on the bus, we continued driving along the Amalfi Coast for half an hour, passing by some incredible villas and seaside towns. We drove through the town of Majori, and then arrived in Maiori, the town where we would be having lunch. A three course lunch was included in the excursion. We ate on the 7th floor terrace of the Hotel Panorama overlooking the Mediterranean. The terrace was reserved for Disney guests only. This lunch is one of those things that you will never forget as long as you live. It was just magical, eating incredible food, and enjoying a view that words cannot describe. We started with an antipasti platter that included grilled eggplant, fresh mozzarella, and prosciutto. We moved on to fresh rigatoni and penne, and finished with gelato for dessert. The meal also included red wine, bottled water, and bottles of coke. They unfortunately made us leave, so we went over to the beach for a little while and I walked into the water for a little while.

Once our free time had ended, we got back on the bus for the last stretch of the Amalfi Coast. We then hopped on the autopista (expressway) and headed for Pompeii. Our guide handed out the headsets for each of us to wear so that we could hear him as we explored the ruins. After arriving at Pompeii, we were given a quick tour of a cameo factory, and allowed to use the bathrooms. Since we had a little free time, we almost bought sodas, until we realized they were 3 Euro. Fortunately our guide had bottles of water for all of us. We then headed into the ruins. Pompeii is absolutely incredible. It stretches over 60 acres, and 45 acres have been excavated. I could not believe how much of the city was still in place. You can still see most of the buildings and palaces, the theatra, the amphitheatra, marble mosaics, painting, ancient graffiti, the original roads, and most impressing, the town forum. The ash preserved the city almost perfectly in many places. The colors of the paintings are still vivid, and the marble is almost perfect. They even had plaster casts made of some of the people who died during the volcanic eruption. You could easily spend days walking around and exploring Pompeii. During our hour and a half, we barely saw 5% of the ruins. On a side note, they had Disney photographers in the forum. It was funny to see people wearing Mickey ears in the ruins of Pompeii.

After we left Pompeii we had an opportunity to use the bathrooms and try the local limoncello. Then we hopped on the bus and were back to the cruise terminal in about half an hour. We were able to board straight into deck 3, through a door I did not even know existed. After dropping our stuff off in the room, we headed up to deck 9 to grab drinks, while I grabbed some ice cream. We sat in the Cove Cafe for a little while to grab some of the afternoon antipasti. Disney Nature: Oceans was playing in the Walt Disney Theatre, but I did not feel like going so I went back to the room to take a shower. We left port around 7:45, we left almost every port late since people were having a hard time getting back to the ship. There was a string quartet playing in the atrium, so I checked them out for a bit before heading up to Deck 10 to watch us sail out of the Bay of Naples. I then headed down to my usual spot in the Promenade Lounge to work on blog posts and enjoy the band playing.

Dinner was in Lumiere's, and we were having the Lumiere's French Menu. Our tablemates were unable to join us, and Summer and Igor's section was very quiet, so we spent a lot of time talking with them. Willy had no one in his section, so he kept coming over to talk to us, it was great to finally spend more then 5 minutes talking to him. After dinner I took a stroll around the ship, popped into Rockin' Bar D, and then went to bed since we had such an early morning the next day.

Up Next Day 9: Civitavecchia, Italy (Rome)

Day 7: Tunis, Tunisia

Today we arrived in our 2nd continent of the cruise, Africa. Since booking the cruise, I had been really excited about going to North Africa, since it is such a different and unique culture. Boy was it different. The night before our arrival, we received an 8.5x11 sheet of paper with instructions and warnings for our arrival in Tunisia, never seen anything like that before. Also, every time Tunisia was brought up around any of the crew members, they would start giving us advice and warnings, and they had only been there once. It seemed like Tunisia made the crew very nervous, and we were very glad that we would not be going ashore on our own.

We woke up around 8 and Mom and I went out on the verandah to check out the port. Our side of the ship was alongside the pier, and we noticed that there was a lot going on down below. Camel rides (even though there are no camels anywhere near Tunis), a Roman gladiator band, and the scariest clown I have ever seen. He waved at us, Mom waved at him, and I pretended that scary clown didn't exist. After my close run in with scary clown, we headed upstairs to Topsiders for breakfast. It was a beautiful day so we sat outside and enjoyed the great views of the area. Our excursion, Sidi Bou Said and Carthage, met at 9:45 in the Walt Disney Theatre, so we got ready and headed down to deck 4. There was a huge line to get into the theatre, since there were 7 buses worth of people going on our excursion. We were assigned to bus 38, and were quickly whisked down to the gangway. Since they have so many excursions going ashore on the Med cruises, they give you numbered stickers and use numbered signs, instead of the character stickers they use in the Caribbean.

Once we were ashore, something else interesting happened. Brent, the cruise director, and Peter, the assistant cruise director, we stopping all of the excursions going ashore to give us even more advice and warnings, this place sure makes them nervous. We avoided the clutches of the clown and were quickly herded past the camels. It turns out that it costs 10euro to ride the camel, 5euro to take a picture, and 5euro to get your camera back if you handed it to someone. These people sure know how to get there money. We passed through immigration, Tunis is the only port on the Med cruise where you need your passport and need to go through immigration, and then onto our bus.

Our first stop on the excursion was the former military harbor of Carthage, now located inside an upscale residential neighborhood. During the time of the Roman Empire, Carthage was second only to Rome, and covered an area even larger then the modern day city of Tunis. From the military harbor, we left for the Antonin Baths. The baths were absolutely incredible. The entire basement system was still intact, as was much of the original marble. The basement itself was about 20 feet tall, and above that would have been almost 90 foot tall arched ceilings. It is so cool to see all of this, and realize that the stories you hear in history class aren't just fiction, but fact. It is amazing to think that buildings that tall, and that large could have been built thousands of years ago. It is also interesting to note that the baths bordered the Mediterranean, and there were soldiers with machine guns guarding them, more signs of what an interesting place Tunisia is. Also, we were commenting on how amazing it was that they didn't charge us to use our cameras inside the ruins, like they do in Mexico, right before our guide told us that Disney included the charge to use cameras in the excursion. Man these people are good.

After about half an hour of free time, we got back on the bus and made a quick stop at the theatra. The original Carthage theatra is still in use today as a concert venue for Tunis. After that stop, we headed for the blue and white berber village of Sidi Bou Said. Our guide was kind and had the bus driver bring us closer to the village then the buses would usually go. At about this point in the excursion, we started to see what the crew had been warning us about. Sidi Bou Said was a tiny, cramped village where the driver's didn't know what a brake was. We had heard that the merchants were extremely pushy, but we didn't find this to be the case. What we did find, was that the roaming vendors were extremely pushy with their flowers, string bracelets, and postcards.

We were taken way up the hill into the village to a museum inside a former palace. The highlight of this museum was that you could climb up to the roof overlook and get an incredible view of Tunis and the Mediterranean. We were not interested in buying any of the items of questionable quality and origin in the village, so we headed back to the bus, barely escaping cars the whole way. While we were waiting for the bus to come back, I watched some interesting goings on in the cafe right by us, and noticed another way that the locals had discovered to make money off of tourists. While we were there, the Tunisian Dinar was trading about 2:1 with the Euro meaning that 1 dinar was worth .50cents in Euro. Also note that it is illegal to bring the Dinar out of the country, making exchange difficult. The cafe, and many other stores, advertised that they accepted Euro. I listened to one of the servers who had just brought two cans of coke to a table say "six" to the couple that was sitting there. So they handed him six Euro instead of six Dinar, and the server said thanks and walked away. Turns out the Tunisians take the Euro and the Dollar at a one to one exchange ratio. Once again, they know how to get there money.

Before long, our guide and the bus arrived, and we headed back to the ship. When we got off the bus at the port, Jason, the shore excursion manager, and his minions were waiting there to ask everybody how their excursions went, and to make sure nobody had any problems. I bet the crew is really hoping that they never have to go to Tunis again after this season, even though its scheduled for next year as well. We headed back through passport control, and the clown was still on the pier, so I darted by scary clown as fast as possible. Back onboard, we headed up to Topsiders for lunch, where we discovered that they were having a locally themed buffet with lamb and couscous and other assorted local dishes. During lunch we had a great conversation with Father Lazarus and his wife Monica. Father Lazarus is a priest in the Coptic orthodox church, which has roots in the Egyptian language, so we had a very cool conversation.

After lunch, I grabbed some ice cream, and then headed to the Cove Cafe to enjoy the beautiful day we were having and catch up on blog posts. We set sail at 4:00, fortunately everyone made it back to the ship, despite the clown's best efforts. I went down to the promenade to watch us sail away, and then sat in one of my favorite places on the ship, the porthole seats by Sessions. The show (Once Upon a Song) was getting ready to start in the WD Theatre, so Neville was downstairs running the wheelchair entrance. I had decided to skip the show after hearing very negative reviews in both March and the Med season. We talked for a while, before I headed back to the room to get ready for dinner at Palo.

Tomas was our server, we had him for brunch on our cruise in March. The meal was as incredible as always, and we had a great view of the sunset. I had decided to do Palo on Tunis night both because we left port in the afternoon, and so we could eat in an Italian restaurant on our way to Italy. It worked out great. The beef tenderloin was cooked perfectly, and the chocolate souffles were better then ever. Our table-mates were also eating in Palo, so we stopped by to say hi on the way out. I headed down to the room to change, and then went to Rockin' Bar D for Match Your Mate. I was really early so I talked with David and DJ Matt for a while, and then joined my friends for the show. They got a good group of people for the show, and David did an awesome job hosting. DJ Matt took over after the show, and I chatted with Jenny for a while before heading off to bed since we had an early excursion planned for Naples.

Up next: Naples, the Amalfi Coast, and Pompeii

Day 6: Valetta, Malta

We found out on our day at sea, that the ship had a few engine troubles, so our arrival in Malta would be delayed from 7:30 until 9:30. This worked out perfectly for us, because it meant that we could be on deck for the sail-in to Malta. I got up around 8:30 to head up on deck. On the way out of our stateroom, we ran into our room steward, Raymund, and talked to him for a while. He is a really nice guy, took great care of our room, and gave us awesome advice about the ports. Once on deck, the views as we were pulling into port were absolutely incredible. The city of Valetta is a walled city, and most of the buildings date back to the 16th century. Words can not describe how awesome it was pulling into the harbour. I have also never seen the crew so excited to be pulling into port. A bunch of crew members had their cameras out, and a ton of officers, including Brent and Peter were on deck. The historian was giving us information about Malta over the loudspeakers.

After we were alongside the pier, we headed down to the buffet in Parrot Cay and ran into Kendell and Charlie, two of our servers from previous cruises. Breakfast was very good, and they had my favorite, the glazed chocolate donuts. It's going to be a good cruise :). We headed back to the stateroom to get ready, and a few minutes later we were crossing the gangway into the second country of our trip. We stopped in the terminal building to use the free wifi. Here is a cruising tip, if you want to find wifi, follow the crew. Once we had checked all of our emails, we had to make sure everything was good back home, we headed out into the city. The architecture of Valetta is very unique. Being halfway between Tunisia and Italy, the buildings are Arabic and Italian all at once. We headed up the steep and winding road into the city, and got some great pictures on the way in. We decided to just start winding our way through the streets exploring and seeing the sights. The entire city is hilly. In some places it gets so bad, they have steps next to the road. We walked through several streets and found a cool overlook of the harbour. I noticed that we were near the famous St. Johns Cathedral, ancient home to the Knights of St. John, so we headed over to take a look.

Across from the cathedral was a restaurant called Cafe Carevaggio. It was an awesome cafe sitting right in the heart of St. John's Square. We ordered some bruschetta, Maltese food is very similar to Italian, and had some Coke's. After out snack we headed down the main road through several of the squares. We stopped into the Palace of the Grand Masters, now the parliament building, and continued on to Fort Elmo and the Mediterranean. While we were down by the fort, we saw a huge domed building and decided to check it out. It turned out to be one of the 365 churches on the island, one for every day of the year. Incredible on such a tiny island. We stopped by a gelato shop for some ice cream, and ate in one of the nearby plazas. We headed down the main road towards the city gates, stopping to briefly check out the archaeology museum. I climbed on top of what I am sure is an old and historically significant gate, and then we proceeded through the city gates. After a stroll through one of the Knight's gardens, we headed back to the terminal for one last burst of internet.

Their was a classic car show on our pier, the officers of the ship didn't look to happy, but there were some awesome cars. We started some laundry since not a soul was in the laundry room, and then grabbed some food from Pluto's. They really loaded me down. I wanted one chicken finger and one taco, not four chicken fingers and two tacos :). I found that I could get a wifi signal from our verandah, so I used Skype to talk with Mary since I was going to be seeing her in a few days. I went to Phil Keller's Magic show at 6:30 in the Walt Disney Theatre, absolutely incredible. This guy really knows his stuff. He even levitated, on a ship. After the show I went back to the room to watch us sail out of Malta, it was just as beautiful as when we were coming in. I went down to the Promenade Lounge to work on blogs, something that was slowly becoming a nightly tradition. No Pluto dancing tonight though.

Dinner was at Animator's Palate, one of my favorite menus of the cruise. Incredible beef tenderloin and a baked apple crumble, all topped off by the restaurant changing from black and white to color. Once dinner was done, Paul Zerdin, a British Ventriloquist, had a hilarious cabaret show in Rockin' Bar D. This guy was absolutely hilarious, and people were talking about him for the rest of the cruise. There was a dance party after the show, Rockin' Country, a line dancing cowboy hat wearing dance party. I had headed to get a drink and missed hats being given out, but Katrina had saved me one, and I ended up out dancing with some of my friends. After the party, I worked on blogs for a little while and then went to bed.

A Quick Update

As I am sure you can tell, the intense port schedule and my need for sleep has forced me to be a bit behind in my blog posts, so I thought I would give you a quick update. The cruise was absolutely incredible, and we were very sad to get off this morning. Our flight to Paris went very well and all of our baggage arrived. We are now at the Paris Airport Hilton eating dinner and enjoying the sunset. Disneyland tomorrow! More blog posts to come.

Day 5: A Day at Sea

The first day of the Mediterranean cruises is a sea day, letting everyone relax after their travels. I woke up around 9:30 and we headed out to breakfast shortly after. We went down to Lumiere's for sea day brunch, and we had Alicia, one of our troublemaking friends from November, serving us. Around 11 we all left Lumiere's and headed upstairs to Studio Sea for the Gold and Platinum Castaway Club reception. We got photos with Mickey, and then talked with Peter, the assistant cruise director, for a while. Captain Thord came to thank us all for coming back to Disney (like they could keep me away if they tried), and Brent, our cruise director, showed us several new videos about the Disney Dream and Castaway Cay enhancements. On the way out of Studio Sea, Mom and I talked with my friend Katrina for a while and got some advice on the various ports.

My parents headed off to relax and enjoy the ship, and I headed down to Parrot Cay for the college club lunch at 12:15; after all, I hadn't eaten since 10:00. I was expecting to be alone, but fortunately several people showed up. Warren and Brittney from Canada, and Tim and Jenny from Minnesota. We were joined by Dave, one of the cruise staffers, and heard some awesome stories about how pretty much everything in Australia can kill you. After the college club, I met up with Mom at 2 for the Disboards meet. On the Disboards, there are several forums where you can talk with other people going on your cruise, to share advice, tips, and planning. We quickly said hi to everyone and then headed upstairs to the Historian's presentation on Pompeii in the Buena Vista Theatre. It was very odd, the lady seemed quite surprised about several of the things on her powerpoint, and didn't know how to pronounce many of the Italian words.

After the presentation, we headed up to deck 9 to get some food for Mom and Dad, and some ice cream for me. It was only my first ice cream of the cruise. I am really starting to slip on the whole eating thing. We ran into Mike and Susan by the pool, so we sat and talked with them for a while by the pool. We also got to see Sammy for the first time. He is our favorite server, and we had requested him but not gotten him. We talked with him for a while, introduced him to Mike and Susan, and he filled us up on Pizza. After a while a combination of cold weather and dinner forced us all to head inside. Mom and I headed downstairs to see Twice Charmed. When we had sailed in March, the cast had just come onboard, and they were pretty terrible. But this time, you wouldn't even know it was the same cast. Awesome show! Since it was formal night, they were having the Captain's welcome aboard reception in the atrium, so we met up with Dad there. I grabbed a picture with Katrina, and then talked to Peter, the assistant cruise director, some more. Later on I joined in on Mom's conversation with Barbara, the head of housekeeping. She was very fun to talk with, and had even worked at Newport Bay Club, the hotel we were staying at in Paris.

Dinner was at 8:30, so we headed into Lumiere's. We had the most prized dinner rotation onboard, Lumiere's on formal night, Parrot Cay on pirate night. Summer and Igor were waiting for us, and our tablemates showed up shortly after we did. Our tablemates were Howard and Nellie from New York, and there friend Trina from LA. Trina works for Walt Disney Imagineering, so I was obviously very happy to have them at our table. We had some great conversations over dinner, and we were very glad that we had good servers and good tablemates for our longest cruise ever. Once dinner had finished up, we headed over to Rockin' Bar D for Phil Keller, the French illusionist's show. It was a great show with some very impressive stuff. I talked with my friends for a while, wrote a blog post, and went to bed.

Up next, our first port of call: Valetta, Malta

Day 4: The Disney Magic

Cruising day had arrived and we woke up early to pack our suitcases. We had to have our bags ready by 8 with the cruise tags on them so that the bellmen could pick them up from our room and have them sent to the ship. Once our bags were packed we left them in the room and headed upstairs to grab breakfast. For the first time since we arrived on Barcelona, the sun was starting to break through the clouds. We were hopeful that we might get one sunny day in Barcelona. As we headed out of the lounge we pretended to say goodbye to the family that was cruising with us to keep up the surprise for the kids. We headed across the street to try and use the wifi at McDonalds, but for some reason it was not agreeing with my iTouch.

We headed back to the hotel, and grabbed the rest of our stuff. We had been told to meet in the lobby at 11:15 and that the bus to the port would be leaving at 11:30. On the way down to the lobby to check out the pool and terrace, since it was finally dry outside. We arrived in the lobby and started chatting with several of the people we had met over the past few days (Susan and Mike; Shelley, Dennis, and the kids), still keeping up the secrecy act for the kids.

Shortly after 11:30 we were on the bus with giant Mickey hands waving goodbye. During the ride, the kids found out that they were going on a cruise. Thank goodness. It was so hard not to slip. The ride to the port took about 15 minutes. As we came over the bridge, we got our first sight of the Magic, she looked beautiful sitting in the Barcelona harbour.

We arrived in to the terminal and were brought right past all of the check-in lines straight to the boarding line for the ship. The line was pretty long, but someone came and grabbed all of the Disney hotel guests and escorted us past the boarding line straight to the ship. Talk about VIP service. A quick family photo was taken and we were walking across the gangway. Katrina, one of my friends on the entertainment staff was working the door, and she announced our arrival after a round of greetings. Oscar was standing just across the atrium, and asked "weren't you just here?" Pretty much :). It is always so wonderful to see the Magic and so many familiar faces. It's just like coming home.

Susan and Mike were right behind us as we boarded, but they needed to make a stop at Guest Services, so we headed up to Topsiders and grabbed seats for the five of us. A funny thing happened well Mom and I were in the buffet line. I was mentioning how our favorite head server Roberto had mentioned that he would be on vacation during our cruise. As I was saying this, Roberto walked around the corner. Craziness. We had a great lunch with Mike and Susan, it was great to get to know them better. Around 2 we headed down to our stateroom. We are in stateroom 7032, a beautiful midship verandah room (cat 5). Mom and Dads suitcases had arrived, but mine was mysteriously absent.

We headed off to walk around the ship and enjoy the beautiful view of Barcelona. The sun was shining and it was finally starting to warm up. After a while we headed back to the room. About 15 minutes before the safety drill, my bag finally arrived. I was starting to get worried. I quickly unpacked all of my stuff so I wouldn't have to worry about it later. That is one of the best parts of cruising, you only have to unpack once.

Shortly before 4 we headed down to our muster station. Oscar was our assembly leader, I told him that we were doomed, lol. After the drill I headed up to deck 10 to gran a table for the sail-away party. I didn't have a lot of competition. The ship is full of new cruisers/tired people, so the sail-away party was one of the quietest I have ever seen. We also didn't sail-away afterwards, since the party was at 4:30 and all aboard time was 9:30.

After the party we walked around the top deck for a while and then ran into Mike and Susan. We talked with them for a while, while several ships and ferries sailed past us. One ship engaged us in a horn battle. Captain Thord started off by sounding the boring navigational horn, but then destroyed the competition with the real Disney horn. Everyone on the other ship cheered for us. Captain Thord walked out to wave at the other ship and Dad called out to him. The Captain seemed very surprised that someone was calling him by name on the first afternoon of the cruise.

I grabbed the first ice cream of the cruise, and then headed to the stateroom to get ready for the show. The welcome aboard show was great. We had Paul Zerdin, a British ventriloquist, and Phil Keller, a French Magician. I headed to the promenade lounge afterwards to write and listen to the band play. They have the same band that was inboard in March, and they are fantastic.

I met Mom and Dad in Parrot Cay. Our tablemates had been slipped in to early seating that night, so we wouldn't be meeting them until the next day. We did find out that one of them was an imagineer, so I was very excited. Our server was Summer from Australia and our assistant server was Igor from Montenegro. We had the Let the Magic Begin menu, and it was delicious. Our serving team wad awesome, very quick service. We realized that our friend Willy was back from vacation, and I went running over to say. Willy is like part of the family, and it is always awesome to see him.

I headed down to Diversions for the college club. Dave was running it, so I talked with him and my good friend Hilda for a while. The cruise staff on this cruise is awesome, so many people I have met before. I headed over to Magic Quest, a hilarious game show that I won in March. I sat and talked with DJ Matt who I had met earlier in the day. David does an awesome job of running Magic Quest and it was hilarious. After the game it was bed time.

Up next: our first day at sea.


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Day 3: Exploring Barcelona

We all woke up around 9 and headed up to the lounge to get some breakfast. I was so glad to see that they has both European style (rolls, cheese, and more rolls) and American style (cereal, fruit, and yogurt) breakfast. We talked with several other people that were cruising out of Barcelona, and then headed out to explore the city.

Since it was a cold, rainy day in Barcelona, we decided to take the Bus Turistic around to explore the city. We headed across the street to a stop for the gren route, which is a connector for the hotel district to the main routes. The bus was sitting there waiting, and three stops later we got off at a transfer point to the red route. When we were unable to board the first red bus that came and were barely squeezed onto the second bus, we quickly realized that the Bus Turstic doesn't work well when it's raining out. Almost two-thirds of the seating is on the upper deck, which was closed due to the rain. So if you are going to Barcelona, just use the metro.

Back on the bus, we were on the red route which runs through the old town and the Olympic grounds. When you get on the Bus they give you ear buds which allow you to listen to a prerecorded tour of the sites in your choice of 10 languages. We started heading through the Ciutat Vella (Old Town) and it was incredible. Barcelona really looks better then the pictures. Having wanted to go to Spain for a long time, I was in heaven.

We got off at Plaza Catalunya planning on switching to the blue route to view the Gaudi architecture and then come back to explore the Ciutat Vella. When we walked up to the stop for the blue route, there was at least a 45 minute line to get on the "hop on, hop off" bus. Seemed like you could get off but not on. We decided to try and get on the bus later, instead of standing in the rain, so I checked the map and we started heading down La Rambla. Then we turned around and found the correct La Rambla. Stupid Spanish maps, at least that is my excuse. We checked out Plaza Catalunya which is the core of the city along with La Rambla, the promenade running from the Plaza to the waterfront.

Once we were actually on La Rambla we stopped to buy umbrellas since we couldn't take the rain anymore. We headed a ways down La Rambla and then headed into the Barri Gotic (Medieval Part of Barcelona).

Taking a break from Barcelona for a moment, something really awesome just happened. I am currently sitting in the Promenade Lounge on the Magic on formal night (our second night onboard) enjoying a beautiful view of the Mediterranean. The band is playing Ring of Fire by Johnny Cash and I just looked up and Pluto was standing on the dance floor all dressed up for formal night dancing with everyone. You gotta love cruising with Disney. Now back to Barcelona,

After heading into the Barri Gotic, we decided to explore on our way to the Barcelona Cathedral. The area is really cool, with very narrow streets, small plazas, and tons of shops and cafes. However, the streets are also very confusing. Twice we ended up going in a circle back to La Rambla, and then we ended up by the waterfront. We hit a major road and decided to follow it up to the cathedral, which we were able to easily find. The cathedral costs five euro, but it is well worth it. After using their bathrooms (aka a hole in the ground in a small outhouse like building) we explored the beautiful building. The artwork and windows were beyond belief. The church was built with 18 side chapels (all lined with gold), a huge tabernacle under the altar decorated with gold, and a naive with palm trees, a pond, and geese (lined with gold)(not really, but that would be cool).

After checking out the cathedral, we started heading toward Ciudad Condal, a restaurant that our concierge had recommended for lunch. On the way, we found a really cool restaurant in the Barri Gotic that seemed to be popular with locals, so we decided to give it a shot. We got a fantastic Spanish fixed course lunch for just over 10 euro. I had a melon salad, chicken, and Catalan cream for dessert. Absolutely fantastic.

After lunch we headed back to La Rambla and checked out the local market which was very cool. Tons of fresh food and of course the famous churros con chocolate. Too bad we were so full from lunch. We started heading back to Plaza Catalunya before I decided that we were going the wrong way and turned around. It turned out that I had been right the first time as we ended up at the waterfront and the Mirador de Colom. The Mirador is a giant tribute to Christopher Colombus as he returned from the new world to Barcelona. I had read that you could go up to an observation deck to get a great view of the city. As we were walking up, I thought to myself, it doesn't look big enough to have an elevator, but it must be bigger then it looks. WRONG! The elevator barely held the three of us and the operator. The observation deck was barely one person wide and you had to shuffle along. It was deffinitely an interesting experience. Most interesting was our observation that they did not send the elevator back up until someone bought a ticket. Our question: what happens to the people who are in the tower at closing?

Having finally escaped the elevator, we walked across the street to a stop for the Bus Turistic hoping it was quiet. We were able to squeeze our way onto the second bus. We were also able to transfer to the blue route and we started heading past some of the incredible Gaudi houses. Shortly, we arrived at his most famous work of all, the Sagrada Familia. It is indescribable. The pictures really don't do it justice. It has been under construction for over 100 years and they are still going. Just incredible.

We headed down to the metro since we were very sick of the Bus Turistic. We bought tickets from one of the machines and headed down to our station. Barcelona has an awesome metro system with very nice, new trains. One train change and a few stops later and we were back at the hotel. We headed up to the lounge for snacks and drinks, and chatted with several fellow cruisers. After a while we went across the street and grabbed dinner in a an awesome Mediterranean restaurant in the mall. We sat next to a family that was also going on our cruise. They were surprising their kids with a cruise, and we were in on the secret. It was very hard at times to not let it slip. After dinner we headed back to the hotel, grabbed some tea, and went to bed.

Day 2: Welcome to Barcelona

Before the trip I had learned that pretty much no cab driver in Barcelona speaks English, so the ride to the hotel would be my first test of using Spanish. I can proudly say that it went very well. I not only got us to the hotel, but I even chatted with the driver on the way.

Something that really struck me on the way to the hotel was how little it felt like a foreign country. From everything I have heard and read, I had expected it to feel very different. Now we were staying in one of the newer parts of Barcelona, Diagonal Mar, but still, it really didn't feel all that different. I also noticed during the drive that Barcelona is an absolutely beautiful city, and it's all built with a great focus on the sea.

After about a 20 minute drive we arrived at our hotel, the Hilton Diagonal Mar. It is a beautiful hotel located right by the Mediterranean with a mall across the street. Even though it was 10am they had our room ready, that was some of the best news I have ever heard. Soooooo tired! We were also upgraded to a beautiful corner suite with a view of the Med. It is an awesome room with a living room, a bedroom, and a huge bathroom with a bidet (so happy to have one of these foot washers as Dad calls it lol). We also have access to the executive lounge on the 15th floor with free food and drinks.

After getting in the room I had to call housekeeping to get my sofa bed made and to get a few towels. Mom and Dad went up to get drinks from the lounge but I collapsed into bed after setting an alarm for a three hour nap.

Five hours later I woke up. We all headed up to the lounge for snacks. WOW! The lounge was avsolutely incredible. It is surrounded with floor to ceiling windows overlooking the city, the mountains, and the sea.

We stayed for a while enjoying desserts, then snacks. I also got to enjoy the European versions of Coke and Coke Light. Aside from being really small and in heavy glass bottles, I actually like their taste better.

After a while in the lounge we headed to the mall across the street to get some dinner, and ended up eating in a Catalan fast food restaurant called Bocatta. Now why do I mention that it was Catalan, because it turned out that we had chosen a restaurant with it's menus totally in Catalan as opposed to Spanish. For everyone who does not know, Catalan is in a region of Spain known as Catalonia, which has an autonomous government, and where the first language is Catalan. Because of this, I ended up with a bacon and cheese sandwich, oops.

After dinner we strolled around the huge, three story mall and grabbed some Ben and Jerry's for dessert. Back at the hotel we grabbed some tea in the lounge and then collapsed into bed.

Day 3 coming soon.

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Crossing the Pond

We left the Delta Sky Club around 5 and headed for our gate. They started boarding shortly after we arrived. We were on a 767 and had booked three seats in the middle section so we could have two aisle seats and our own row. Our plane also had Delta On Demand entertainment so each seat has it's own touch screen tv's with 10 movies, music, tv shows, games, and a live flight map. It sure made the flight go by a lot faster.

We had a long wait to take off because of the high winds in Atlanta, but it only put us about 15 minutes behind schedule. We had a bumpy flight almost the whole way but is smoothed out as we got closer to Spain. Shortly after takeoff, they passed out the immigration arrival cards and then began the first drink service. They had to hold off on the meal service due to a patch of really bad turbulence. Dinner was very good, we had a choice of either lasagna or chicken.

During dinner I watched Shirlock Holmes. Afterwards I tried going to sleep, but that never works well for me when flying. I decided to wait to go to sleep so I watched the Men Who Stare At Goats. Really good movie that helped pass the time. I tried sleeping again and got about an hour of sleep befor being waken up by the sun in my eyes, oh the joys of an overnight flight. They turned on the lights about an hour and a half before landing and served us a continental breakfast. We landed in Barcelona only 10 minutes late. I have never been so happy to get off a plane in my life.

We headed through immigrations with only a short wait. I got my first passport stamp, YAY!!! After hearing about all of the baggage problems in the Barcelona Airport we were glad to see our bags come around the carousel. We took our bags through customs and headed to the taxi stand. Sooo tired! More to come later.


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Day 1: The Adventure Begins

Our trip has finally arrived. I actually managed to get a good night of sleep, very rare for me before a trip. We all got up around 6:30 this morning and headed to the airport around 8:00 after taking care of all the last minute details.

We dropped the car off at our usual airport parking place, and we were at the Delta check-in desk in no time. Here is where things got interesting. Before scanning our passports, we had checked to see of there were any better seats available. There were no other seats available, but we were all still sitting together in row 29. The machine indicated that it was having an error checking us in. When the agent pulled up our info, Dad was in row 32, Mom was in row 27, and I no longer had a seat. Slight problem. No one really seemed to know what had happened in those five minutes. Fortunately the agent took good care of us and gave us 3 exit row seats, one in row 26 and two in row 27. If my seat disappearing means I get more leg room, I have no problem with that.

With all of the check-in craziness behind us, we headed for security and were through in no time. After a quick monorail ride, we headed up to the Delta Sky Club to grab some drinks and relax. With how busy the airport was today, it was great being able to enjoy the peace and quiet and especially the comfy seats.

Our flight started boarding around 11:00. We ran into some more craziness here. About 5 minutes after we were seated on the plane, the flight attendants came on and asked the following people to push the flight attendant call button of they were on the plane:
Michael Dion
Joan Schmiedicke
At this point we were even more confused. Why were they asking, and why didn't they call Dad too. Fortunately they didn't throw us off the plane, but it was all really wierd. Our flight to Atlanta was only an hour, but we arrived 30 minutes early. Even the pilot sounded surprised about that one.

Since we had almost five hours to kill, we headed to our usual bar and grill on the second floor of the A concourse. We had a great talk with some army reservers who had just come home from Iraq. After lunch we headed to the international concourse and the Delta Sky Club to wait forour flight.

That's all for now. The next post will be coming from Europe. Have a great Monday everyone!

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Location:Atlanta, GA

Pre-Trip #2

1 Day Left!

Tomorrow is the big day. After booking this trip almost 18th months ago, it is hard to believe that this trip is finally here. We will be getting up bright and early to head to the airport. Since coming home from UF I have been almost constantly researching various things for this trip. I have gained a pretty good understanding of Paris and Barcelona transportation. I still have some work to do on Corsica and Malta, the two ports that we don't have excursions planned for.

I actually managed to get packed up yesterday, a record for me. Usually I am packing on my way out of the house. This is the least I have ever packed for a cruise, and my magical carry-on is ready to take care of me through the trip in case the Barcelona airport loses our luggage (something they have been known to do). This carry-on is really the greatest thing ever. It holds a ton more then I expected and is still incredibly light. I never thought it would be this easy to pack light, but my suitcase is only 2/3 full. Its all about changing your thinking. Usually we pack for the worst case scenario, you just have to pack for the best case scenario and decide what you really need and what you really don't need.

I can already tell you that the iTouch/iPhone is a must have for traveling. I have been buying apps left and right and it will be saving a lot of work throughout the trip. There are translators, currency converters, city maps, metro guides and route planners, mini travel guides, and a ton of other awesome stuff.

That is it for tonight. Time to get some sleep.

Location:Orlando, FL