Cruisin’ the Mediterranean

Last week we finally took off on our week long Mediterranean cruise that we've always dreamed of doing. Seven nights at sea on the Norwegian Gem visiting exotic places sounded like just what I needed after a few of my taxing 38 hour workweeks and work trip to sunny San Diego.

Our cruise began with a short flight to Barcelona...or so we thought. We decided to take the low cost airline, Ryanair, not realizing that when they said Barcelona, they meant Girona...a town over an hour from the city. This wasn't an issue on the way out, but since we scheduled our flight back for 6:15 am the following week, it made for a brutal morning wakeup call at 2:30am. In hindsight, we should have done more research, but live and learn I guess. After an uneventful flight and hour long bus ride to Barcelona, we were on the boat by 2:00 pm and relaxing with an umbrella drink by 2:30. The boat didn't leave until 7:00 that night, so we had a few hours to sip drinks and enjoy the views of the city from the top deck of the enormous cruise ship.

Day one was a day at sea, which we used to sleep, drink, and gamble. The ship had a large casino and plenty of areas to sit and relax and listen to music. It was a nice relaxing day, just what we needed after all of the recent travelling. The next day we arrived in the island country of Malta, a place which I had never heard of and knew nothing about. It's a small island off the southern cost of Italy and a former British colony, which meant that most people spoke English. Malta was one of those places that looks amazing in pictures and from a distance, but once you get into the city (called Valetta) there isn't a whole lot to look at. It's nice enough, but was a little old and rundown, and not many exciting things to see. We took a bus to the center of the city and then spent a few hours walking back to the ship. There were some beautiful ocean views, but not much else. The highlight of Malta was finding a small area full of little shanties housing local fisherman. There were two men on the dock fishing, with three cats waiting impatiently to pounce on anything they caught. It was fun to watch the cats jump up in anticipation every time they pulled their lines out of the water.

On day three we arrived in Naples, Italy. Since there is a major NATO base there, many of my coworkers have been to the city and warned us that it is not a place where you want to wander around on your own. We took their word for it and scheduled an excursion to a small village just south of the city called Sorrento. The drive down took us through Naples, which I must admit didn't look too impressive. However, Mount Vesuvius loomed in the background and was an amazing sight to see. Our tour guide was a native Italian whose broken English made her sound just like Borat..."we stop here and you can make the picture niiicccee." Sorrento turned out to be exactly what we were looking for, a beautiful little seaside town with small shops and restaurants. We wandered the city a little bit and then had coffee and gelato (Italian ice cream...AMAZING stuff!) at a cafe overlooking the ocean.

Day four was in Rome...or more specifically Civitavecchia, the port about 1 1/2 hours from Rome. As we had just been in Rome a few months ago visiting my mom, we decided to stay on the boat that day. Despite the predictions of rain, it was 75 degrees and sunny, so we spent the day in the pool and jacuzzi. Usually these were too crowded to enjoy, but with most of the guests in Rome it was quite pleasant.

Day five took us to Livorno, Italy, which is the port town close to Florence and Pisa. Here we decided to pay the money for a tour to both cities. After an hour drive to Florence, we had a nice walking tour of the city. Unfortunately I think we had our expectations set too high for Florence, as we were both a little disappointed. The city was very nice, but nothing too spectacular. It is a several hour wait to see Michelangelo’s David so we didn’t have time for that, and the full size replica was under renovation, so we didn’t even get to see it. The tour did include a nice lunch at a 5 star hotel which was fantastic. We had authentic Italian lasagna (good but no Stouffer’s…kidding of course) and more gelato. At the table we even sat next to another American family living in Belgium…what a small world!

After Florence the tour took us to Pisa, where we were able to stand under the famous leaning tower. This bizarre building did live up to expectations as it was both beautiful and scary…it really looks like it’s going to fall over at any minute. We took our obligatory photo of Elizabeth holding it up, and then headed back to the bus. I have to say that if you’re ever looking for a fake Rolex or Gucci bag, that is the place to go. I can’t even count how many times that I was offered a “Rolex” for only 30 Euro.

Next on the list was Villefranche sur Mer, a small town just outside Nice, France. There wasn’t really a port here, the ship just anchored in the bay, and they stuffed us on the lifeboats to go to the shore. This town was absolutely beautiful. Mansions built on the side of mountains overlooking the crystal blue water and little seaside restaurants and cafes were everywhere. We took the ten minute train ride into Nice and spent the day wandering the town and strolling along the shore. We are definitely going to plan a trip back to Nice…it seems like the perfect city to spend a few romantic and relaxing days.

Finally, the boat brought us back to Barcelona, where we spent our last day. After getting off the ship and checking into our hotel, we took the bus tour of the city, getting off a few times to see some touristy spots. There is a famous architect named Ghadi who designed many buildings there so we spent a while hunting them all down. His designes alone are worth the trip to Barcelona, as they look like something straight out of Alice in Wonderland. Dramatic colors and siding that appears to be melting seem to be his signature, and his buildings are both beautiful and bizarre at the same time. The church that he designed (Sagrada Familia) has been under construction for over 100 years as it’s entirely funded by donations. There really aren’t words to describe it, but it’s worth a few minutes of web research to see some photos of it…simply amazing.

The next day we woke up at 2:00 am to take a cab to the bus station, then a bus to the airport, and then fly back to Belgium. Unfortunately the fog was so bad at our airport that they circled for an hour, attempted two landings and aborted, then finally redirected us to another airport. From here they put us on another bus to the original airport where we finally picked up our car and drove home.

Despite the long trip home, it was still a wonderful vacation. Next up, a Scandinavian cruise!