Barcelona is Spain’s second largest city after Madrid and the capital of Catalonia. It is also the largest metropolis on the Mediterranean Sea. Founded as a Roman city in 15 BC centered on a military camp on the “Mons Taber”, a little hill where the city hall is located now.
The Barri Gotic (Gothic Quarter) is the centre of the old city of Barcelona. Many of the buildings date between the Roman and medieval periods. Catalan modernista architecture (Art Nouveau) developed between 1885 and 1950 can be seen throughout the city. The most famous architectural work by Antoni Gaudi and listed world heritage sites. His most famous but unfinished church of the Sagrada Familia, which has been under construction since 1882 is finally expected to be finished in 2026.
Barcelona contains seven beaches, totaling 4.5 km of coastline listed as number one in a list of top ten city beaches in the world by National Geographic and Discovery Channel. These seven beaches are split by the Olympic Harbor which lies at the end of the famous street, “La Rambla”.
The open top bus rides are worth a try in Barcelona as there are three overlapping routes which you can hop on and off as you wish. Because of the size and complexity of the city, plan your route beforehand to ensure you get time to visit the places that interest you.
It turned out that you have to log onto and purchase your wi-fi each time you use it. Its €10 for one hour plus €3 for each purchase. You can reuse your time if you log out. I will but 3 hours in a minute but cant remember how much it is.
We had a great sleep last night in our Queen sized bed and the gentle sway of the waves. We awoke to blue skies and what looked like a very nice day. Breakfast was ok but it couldn’t be compared with the QM2, whereas the dinner was comparable. It was mainly buffet style which created a bit of a “bunfight” atmosphere. You could order from a menu but service was very slow. It was almost impossible to get a cup of tea as they are so geared up for coffee, but I guess that’s understandable. I still enjoyed it but it wasn’t 5 star.
As most of the trips are about €49 and above we opted to take a walk into Barcelona. Big mistake when you are wearing new shoes. We were at terminal D which is the last one and we had to walk miles to even get to the bridge to the mainland. The bridge was literally miles across to the mainland and when we eventually got there we had miles to walk to the start of La Ramblas. So all together we had to walk miles x 3 both ways.
La Ramblas is miles as well so we didn’t walk its entire length and my feet were killing me and I needed the toilet. We thought about siting down and buying a coffee but then thought again. We have lovely coffee on board ship and I am going to try a Caribbean coffee (with rum) while Claire wants an Irish coffee. And its all on our all inclusive card.
I worked it out today, and we have already broken even going all inclusive in just 24 hours so effectively we have the rest of the week free. Got to go down for our coffee’s now, see you tomorrow in Palma De La Majorca. Also an update for the rest of today; I think it will make sense for me to publish at lunch time each day rather than in the evening when our time is more precious. Remember, we are All Inclusive! Boy, did they make a mistake and we haven't even had time to drink our welcome champagne yet. Kenneth, our cabin boy (it should have been Roger), keeps filling up our ice bucket twice a day and he even tidies up after us. He must be after a good tip.
I had a nightmare with the internet, its €24 for 3 hours plus €3 registration fee and once you have paid it you can hardly use it. The only way that I could get pictures on was to edit them to below 256K otherwise it would freeze up. I hate paying good money for crap service.
Lunch was a s good as dinner, a proper sit down where you order what you want from a menu. We noticed another course, cheese and you can still have a desert if you have this course. We didn’t get a very good seat though; Its really cosmopolitan here and they plonked a French couple right next to us. If that’s not bad enough, he started sneezing and coughing through his entire meal. I leant away from him as much as I could but that wouldn’t stop the millions of bacteria and viruses spread throughout the room, some of which would be certain to land on my meal. By the time he left, I had already started sneezing myself and as the day gets longer I feel worse and worse. Constant nose run and I feel like I have a temperature coming on. All those courses at dinner and all I could manage was a soup without a roll. I felt so poorly I was in my jim-jams by 7.45 with my bottle of water and a toilet roll.
On our first day, we had the obligatory safety meeting where they try to sell all the excursions. It was quite funny though, as quite a few people turned up with their safety vests on and the lady stressed so much how none of the staff would leave before all the passengers had and that the captain would be the last one off. Our meeting point is not far from our room and there are enough lifeboats to seat everyone. Thats as long as there are no Bengal Tigers aboard.
Tomorrow, we arrive at Palma and its not a long trip as we didn’t leave Barcelona until 8pm. Sorry this is a bit disjointed, but I am not writing it all in one go. I’m doing a bit here and there, as I can and then, very quickly going online, once a day to load stuff on to try and preserve my precious wi-fi time. Its a bit of a trek to visit a bar from our room to get a drink, you have to go up and down lifts as you cannot walk through along each deck. Claire just arrived back with some drinks and she has left her Costa card at the bar so she has to go all the way back again. Never mind, at least she can bring
some more drinks while she is there.
Sounds pretty good so far guys.
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