Hi friends! Sorry I haven’t
updated in awhile, I had a bit of a scare with my computer. It would turn on
but the screen stayed white and it was making a clicking noise like it was
trying to work but couldn’t. I still don’t know what the cause was but it seems
to be working a bit better, fingers crossed.
So backing up, April 22nd
-23rd was our overnight in Barcelona, Spain. The first day we walked
to La Sagrada Familia, a gorgeous church that will take the next 40 years to
complete because of the detailing on the structure. We also made it to Can
Mila, one of the many interestingly shaped buildings in the city. There were a
lot of amazing shopping and artwork on Las Ramblas, the famous main street. It
was insanely crowded because, as we discovered later, it was a holiday. It was
Sant Jordi (Saint George), their equivalent of our Valentine’s Day. The fable begins a long
time ago, when there was a dragon that was terrifying the town with it’s
ferocious attacks. The town struck up a deal with the dragon that they would
sacrifice one townsperson every so often, if the dragon would leave the rest of
the town in peace. This worked for a while until one day; the Princess’ name
was drawn for the sacrifice. The king was very upset but what could he do? He
had to keep the peace for his people. So the Princess was sent to the dragons’
lair. George followed her and killed the dragon, bringing the Princess back
unharmed and saving the town. The tradition of Sant Jordi is for men to buy
their female loved ones a rose and the woman buy their men books.
Meghan, Brit and I stopped
into a cute restaurant for a very nice meal and drinks before heading back to
the ship. Later that night, we met up with Erin and took the shuttle to the
center of the city. From there, we took a taxi to Opium, the club our crew
friends were all meeting at. However, we are used to the American way of life,
so we thought getting there at 11:30p was late, but the club wasn’t even open
yet! We decided to wait at the bar in a restaurant called Carpe Diem. The
bartender was really awesome and we hung out chatting with him for quite a long
time. We headed over to Opium and learned you had to pay 20 euro to get in!
That included one free drink but still!!!!! We decided to try the club right
next to it called Shoko, and got right in. It was very crowded and a lot of
fun, dancing with my girls. We stuck out like sore thumbs because not only did
we look American, we could actually dance! So guys would try to dance with us
but we would all grab hands, yell “ABORT!” and run to another spot on the dance
floor. It was ladies night, fellas!
The next day I got off with
Meghan and Brit. There was a really cute bakery we stopped into for breakfast.
I love the tiny espressos they give you in Europe. We walked to the Magic Fountain,
a beautiful building with a waterfall and a fountain in a square. The fountain
is only on at night but it was still worth the visit. We witnessed some great
Spanish policeman work as two cops chased after two men running with bags. As
the chase ensued, fans, hats and other popular souvenirs fell to the ground. My
guess is they were selling stolen goods. The cops caught one of the guys as he
tried to go down the stairs. You go, po po! I saw the football (American soccer) stadium and we stopped
for some delicious tapas (I had a cheese and potato omelet on bread) before
going back to the ship.
Palma de Mallorca, Spain
was our next port. This was a tiny town so Erin, Freddie, Rachel, Ann and I
took our time meandering around. We started at a coffee shop for a cappuccino
and some snacks. The main attraction of the city was their church so we walked
there next. It was such a beautiful day and we had a lot of fun walking around
this nice city.
Our next port was supposed
to be La Goulette (Tunis), Tunisia however we were not able to go. The captain
told the ship that this port is very difficult to sail into and the weather
conditions that day made it too dangerous to attempt. :(
We did make it to Palermo,
(Sicily), Italy on April 27th. Ann, Rachel, Erin, Brit, Meghan and I
got off to wander around, but our main mission was food and drinks. I had
another AMAZING plate of gnocchi, this time with marinara sauce. I’m definitely
a happy camper eating all this delicious Italian food in Italy.
April 28th was
Naples, Italy. Naples was surprisingly disgusting. I was expecting it to be
beautiful after seeing Eat, Pray, Love. I think they were very selective on
where they filmed because it was trashy with trashy men yelling things at us.
Ann, Brit, Rachel and I wandered around trying to figure out where to go. We
ended up chasing after a guy with a coffee tray, because if he was headed back
to his coffee shop we could get internet and do some research. We caught up to
him and ended up having delicious coffee at his place. They were all so nice to
us. We decided to take a train to Sorrento, a resort. After having a hilarious
trip to the station; bobbing thru the traffic of people and cars, trying to
remember what country we were in so we could ask directions, we finally made it
and hopped on the train. Sorrento was absolutely beautiful. We had an amazing
lunch at a country club on the edge of the cliff with a stunning view of the
water below us. We saw Mount Etna, the volcano, in the distance on our train
ride back to Naples.
The next day was
Civitavecchia (Rome), Italy, our homeport. Our mission of the day was to see as
much as we could. We started by taking the train for about an hour to the
Coliseum. We discovered that our train tickets also doubled for Metro tickets
so we were able to get around a lot faster this day. The Coliseum was really
cool to see and imagine the ancient gladiators. One day I would like to come
back and walk around inside. We took the Metro to the Trevi fountain where I
threw a euro coin and made a wish, another life long dream accomplished. :) The
Spanish steps were near by so we walked to that square and took a lot of
pictures of the beautiful architecture and flowers.
Stay tuned for my update on
our Greek ports, possibly my favorite place in the world! <3>
