TransAtlantic Cruise – Barcelona 1st Day

August 18, 2007

We ascend into Barcelona through heavy cloud cover, to rain. Pretty novel for us since we haven’t had any in Atlanta for a while. Immigration was very quick thanks to Delta giving us the paperwork on the plane and the officer being on the phone. I don’t think he even looked up when he stamped our passports.

While we were waiting for our luggage there was a Disney Cruise Line rep walking through the crowd who gave us stickers to wear on our shirts to identify us as DCL passengers and told us where to take our luggage. The whole luggage process went smoothly if not too quickly and our large group gathered to head outside.

The rain had stopped so we only had to dodge puddles on our way to the bus. Onboard the bus we learned our 8 mile ride to port would take about 30 minutes. On the way we passed the “Damm Brewery”. Wish I had gotten a picture of that. Paul & I like to try the local beer when we travel, no matter how bad it may be.

After we got checked in, which took no time at all, we passed by an area where local dancers were performing and Mickey was watching, got a few pictures of Mickey, had our Welcome aboard picture taken and headed up the gangway. We stopped by our room where we found a bottle of champagne from our travel agent Vickie (MouseFanTravel,.com) and a leather travel wallet which was our Castaway Club gift.

We hadn’t had much breakfast so we headed up to Topsiders for some lunch. After that Paul, who was suffering more from the redeye flight than jet lag, went back to the room to crash and I went to the Vista Spa to book the rainforest room for the two weeks. The Rainforest Room is a serene room in the Vista spa with heated tile loungers, 3 steam room/ sauna, and a couple of scented showers. It’s one of our favorite places onboard ship.

From there I went to Palo’s, DCL’s private adults only dinning room to get on the waiting list for a second dinner. We’re having dinner with Vickie & Mike there on Monday night but we were hoping to get a second dinner for just the two of us. I told them it was our 15th anniversary and she found us a table for two no waiting at 8:30 on the 29th. Unfortunately that is Pirates In the Caribbean night – the only night I didn’t want, because we have costumes to wear. I turned it down and asked that we just be put on the waiting list. She kept looking and found us a table for two in Aug 30 th!

Additionally I checked to see if Vickie had been successful in adding us to her Palo’s brunch reservation, she had!! I’m happy now. Paul was napping when I got back to the room and I tried to lie down too. I couldn’t lie still, so I got up and moved to our sofa with my book, read a little bit then took a short nap. I woke up just before 5:00 and woke Paul up to do the lifeboat drill that I thought was at 5. It was at 5:30 so we had time to unpack.

After the mandatory lifeboat drill which we grabbed a snack and caught the port bus, it runs between the port and Las Ramblas a pedestrian street lined with restaurants, shops, street vendors and street performers. We walked along the harbor then checked out the street vendors. Las Ramblas is in the Gothic Quarter and there are many side streets and squares to explore, wandering down one of these we discovered an Irish Pub, Molly’s Fair City, Well I’m Irish so we have to go in right? We thought this was pretty novel, an Irish pub in Barcelona, later we realized they’re all over the place. While we were having our pints we asked the bartender where to eat, she gave us directions to L’Arqeutera (hope that’s right I’m reading her hand writing) she said walk along the street and listen for locals, well we found it easy enough and were checking out menus when we found Taller de Tapas, which was recommended by PassPorter so of course that’s where we ate. Tapas along with a pitcher of Sangria were just what we needed to get our first night of vacation off to a good start.

Lynn

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