mom2mybugs

Lol...I thought about that when I typed the me lol. I think I ordered anniversary decorations for the ship but I can't remember... That will make up for that if I did lol! Jane

I'm glad!! We are scheduled to go on rhapsody next spring break for a western Caribbean cruise... Hoping we can take it as my husband hasnt sailed out of Tampa and we've never been on her. However, the Europe bug has us bad and we might try to go to England, Scotland and Ireland next summer... Money with a kid in college (and one just done and one in 2 years) is beginning to run out lol!!! Jane

So did you find anything??? We had Kermit's key lime pie... Amazing and I don't like key lime. We also got the schnauzers some key lime doggy treated... They were happy!! Jane

Ok...I teach preschool ...I hear that song in my sleep lol! Jane

Today!! Almost caught up! And happy 29th anniversary to me!!!! Cannot believe we are spending it here in Barcelona! We had gone back and forth whether to try and get ourselves to sitges, a beach town best Barcelona. We found a tour that combined it with a trip to Tarragona to see the ancient Roman ruins. We left at 830 (walked a half hour to get there... Which was awesome! I have over 6 miles a day walking here to balance out the gelato!). It was amazing! Tarragona has an incredibly well preserved aquaduct you can actually walk on top of! It was so cool. In addition the city has an ampitheater, a circus, City walls... It was amazing! Cannot wait for Rome and Athens! I can't believe NONE of my ampitheater pics were on my phone lol!! I'm an awful blogger! You will have to come to Tarragona to see it! Then it was on to the beaches at sitges. We decided to do lunch first at a cafe for, what else, cheese and ham table and paella. Oh yes, and finally tried cava sangria...yum, just yum! I keep forgetting to take pics BEFORE we eat most of things!!! We spent about an hour in the water and on the beach with a beautiful breeze blowing and incredible waves to jump in! It was totally packed so I'm glad we didn't spend the whole day, but we came home tired and happy! So by the time we showered and packed it was close to 9...we decided 2 Spanish heavy dinners was not going to happen, so we did the pathetic American thing and ate Five guys with an amazing view of Sagrada familia! I know... Pathetic! Finally impressions of Barcelona:. We enjoyed it but not as much as Paris. 4 days was plenty and we feel we missed some things we wanted to hit (the Miro museum and the magic fountains, and a few better restaurants) but overall had a nice time. We enjoyed the openness and ease of the Sagrada neighborhood but wouldn't be opposed to bring closer to old Town. Our favorite things were Sagrada familia and the neighborhood Cafe by the Picasso museum that was totally off the beaten track! And so tomorrow morning we board vision of the seas! Apparently the last sailing had some tough weather and seas (they were unable to go to Santorini and the water is really rough right now as they head towards Barcelona. We forgot to buy sea sickness meds for Jeff just in case so I will try and do that tomorrow morning! Hoping we get calmer seas!!! Jane

After the rain passed it turned into a gorgeous don't day. The heat has definitely broken... It's still summer but the nights are cool and it hasn't been deadly during the day. We wandered all over the Gothic quarter... Kinda following the lonely planet waking tour and stopping when we wanted. We finally found Madison her espadrills (she has been looking for months for the pair she wanted!), Watched street performers, enjoyed the many plazas and basically got a feel for the old area. It was a cool way to spend most of a day. Did I mention more gelato? It may be a theme!!! Ones to the ramblas. It was an interesting area...my favorite part was the huge food market. I will be honest... There is so much being sold on the street that it is overwhelming. I actually felt pretty safe but it was daylight and nobody grabbed anything. After wandering all day we ended up at a horrible little cafe for dinner... It really wasnt good. We have found that the than the pizza find, we have ended up mostly in tourist trap eateries because of where we are staying. But that's been ok....I think actually we have been spoiled by the amazing tapas place we have at home! Jane

I'm a day behind lol!! Gotta catch up! So yesterday we wanted to do the ramblas and the Gothic quarter. We got to the Barcelona cathedral around 9 and looked at every single chapel! All 10 million pics are on my other camera but here are the amazing geese that live in the cathedral. So the funny story is that we went into the chapel to pray... And then Mass started! We were stuck for 45 minutes. We do NOT understand Catalan, so we didn't understand anything, but it was still cool! So we walked out and the predicted thunderstorm opened up from the heavens. We ran to the tourist trap across the street from the cathedral and tried to sit outside before moving inside when the rain was going sideways. We spent a lovely 2 hours drinking wine and eating tapas and vegetable paella while the rain poured (with sorbet and cafe con leche for dessert).

Really enjoying the pics. It really does feel like a bigger ship with all those big open areas. I found all the windows helped a lot on makes. Thanks so much for the galley tour... So interesting! And the flag ceremony is one of my favorite things on the ship... Especially in the centrums! Jane

I grew up flying out of that airport and that is definitely crazy! Yuck... Not a fun way to start the trip! Jane

Day 2 pre-cruise Barcelona was a great day. Once again my good pics are on my camera but if you do one thing in Barcelona, go to the segrada familia. It was amazing. I hadn't seen pictures if the inside and it was spectacular. The audio tour talked about how all the sculpture and status are outside (except one of each of the hold family), which makes the inside more about the amazing space and structure. It was incredible!! We spent probably close to 3 hours there before heading back to the Airbnb to rest for an hour or so. After that we headed to the Picasso museum which was very interesting. It's not crowded or hard to get to and while it doesn't have many Davis paintings there, there is an incredible amount of his early work. It was interesting to watch him try out different types of painting before he found his own unique style. We left and decided to sit for a bit before heading back on the metro. We locked into a really great neighborhood Cafe that we enjoyed! We tried our first glass (well maybe 2) of cava and were getting ready to go when a street performer showed up with his sax to play American jazz. So we ordered a cheese plate and another glass of cava and stayed for awhile. It was so incredibly relaxing! I wish I'd taken more pics on my phone. There were so many people just out walking their dogs and chatting with each other. It was wonderful and relaxing and I could do it every day! In attempting to walk back to the metro, we happened upon the back of a big church. Walking around to the front we realized it was the cathedral of Barcelona. A street performer was getting ready to perform and there were a bunch of small cafes for dinner, but Madison was fading. It never feels late but it was after 10 by the time we got home. Hopefully we will get to the Gothic quarter and the ramblas tomorrow but there is an 80% chance of thunderstorms. Oh well...we will give it a shot and if it falls, then we head to a cafe for lunch! Jane

We enjoyed it. It was not super crowded and they had a lot of his early and late works. Very little of his famous cubist period but the rooms where he painted pieces like valasquez's work Les meninas were really cool!!! It's pretty near the Gothic quarter and free with the Barcelona card if you get it. They had a temporary exhibit we didn't go into that had photographs of Picasso and it looked like it would be good! Jane

It was soooo good. We needed something simple... Madison's had eggplant with ricotta and ours was salami with fennel. Jane

Since there are so many Disney fans here, I have to post this picture I saw near an apartment! Today we spent several hours at segrada familia and now are trying to great you the energy for a couple hours at the Picasso museum! More later! Jane

The end of the first day was amazing! We knew we would be tired so found a great Italian pizzeria. Drank cervasa and are thin pizza! We finished the night with a walk to get gelato near the segrada familia. The area is so funny... There is a whole street filled with 5 guys, McDonald's, taco Bell etc! The gelato was just ok but what was amazing was there was a big street concert set up. We ate our gelato on the stairs of the segrada familia listening to music. Amazing!!

We are going to try and do this tomorrow! Jane

We are in an airbnb a few blocks from the segrada familia. It is a neighborhood with a mix of tourists and locals. There are tons of supermarcats to grab food from, and bakeries and gelato places (the one we tried last night was just ok... Looking forward to Italy lol). Airbnb pics: View from our tiny terrace: Again... More pics on the camera, but it's a decent 2 bedroom with 2 bathrooms. There are definitely issues... The walls are paper thin in this apartment and we hear lots of street noise... That's ok... But Madison hearing people at 3am doing "other things" wasnt great. There is also only 1 little futon to sit on in the living room. But it really is a nice spot for us! Jane

More highlights:. Gaudi architecture is amazing. It is much more interesting than it is in the pictures. Our driver was awesome about stopping and having us take some pics! Apparently casa Mila (the first one) was called "the stone quarry" by the owners... They hated it. It is fascinating to look at these "modernism" buildings right next to Gothic type older buildings. Jane

Our tour was very nice. Plenty of time to see things and get out of the very nice van. Here are some highlights:. Park guell:  I apologize in advance...I'm taking most pics on my camera but trying to do some for here on my phone. I had beautiful pics of the buildings with the columns in the back. I also have some amazing pics of the tile work close up. The pics here don't do it justice! Give yourself at least an hour here... We only had an hour and we'd have liked at least another half hour or so. Jane

Ok... Still haven't figured out resizing so what I may do is a lot of small posts! Or flight took off over an hour late I can't fault Norwegian airlines since it was ohare traffic. They did make up a ton in the air (arrival times are seriously passed) so we were only 25 mins late. I got maybe 2 hours sleep overnight. The seats are divided and you can't lift the armrests so it was tight for our family (we were hoping to squash the skinny teenager lol) but would be good if you were sitting with strangers. The food was really solid for dinner (I had the Korean beef stew), and we were able to order a vegetarian meal for Madison. They even brought her a vegetarian breakfast the next morning! Bonus I picked the exit aisle at the boarding door for no extra fee. We had to store our bags at take off and landing but they let us keep them under our feet the whole rest of the flight. Tons of leg room and it was free!!!! We arrived maybe 25 mins late. Customs and baggage was an absolute breeze and when we got out our driver from Barcelona City tours was there with a sign to get us out of the airport. It was so much less crowded and stressful than O'Hare! Jane

Lol... Can you believe I've never gone!! Hate dealing with the crazy amount of people lol!!!! Guess I will have to have another quiet drink in a cafe! Jane

We are at the airport!!! Getting ready to board... The plane got in late but they insist they will board us quickly! We will see! Since I got 4.5 hours sleep last night I'm hoping I will sleep on the plane!!! Jane

So far it's been fine... Was about 30-45 mins to check in... Guy was super nice. You had to stand in line though...no self check kiosk because they actually do weigh all the carry on luggage as well. I had to give Madison one of my bags lol! The gate area is really open and roomy though. I like the international terminal at O'Hare... Much less crowded and busy than the domestic terminals!

Ok...it is two in the morning and I can’t sleep lol! We leave for the airport in 13 hours ?. I better get up early so I can try and sleep on the plane!! We have had a number of curves thrown our way...found out that my daughter needs to have surgery when we get back and I’m having to have some blood tests done. Yikes! But all should be ok and hopefully we are done with surprises! Norwegian air doesn’t let us check in online...which makes me nervous! We do have our seats though and we’re planning on getting to the airport 3 hours early. This is when it’s good to leave the teens home...one of them can drive us to the airport!! I can take the Uber fees and buy a sun hat in Cannes!! The weather is still pretty darn hot in Europe but that will be ok with me (hubby and daughter not so much lol). More to come later today! Need to go find the stream on apps for compressing pics! Jane

Thanks twangster! It looks like an amazing ship and like Sabrina, I enjoy the pics because I’m thinking I won’t get on it. I have yet to meet a class I haven’t liked and I’m sure I’d enjoy empress! Jane

I was thinking the same thing. We docked way out at the naval station and when your tired and hot, it felt like forever away. Jane