Our Magical "It's All Part of the Adventure" London + 10-Night Med Cruise - July 2018 - Completed!

[disneyfaninaz]

Lovely trip report! I feel like I'm following in your footsteps a bit; I read your Alaska trip report before we went to Alaska last summer, and now I'm reading this one before we go on the British Isles trip this year and the Mediterranean trip next year!

I also live in Phoenix, and saw the Pompeii exhibit twice over the past 6 months. Very well done, wasn't it?

One more comment; I have had a devil of a time figuring out air transportation from Phoenix. I too had read that the nonstop flights from British Airways are lovely in terms of convenience, but a bit rough around the edges in terms of the actual airplanes. We also are looking for premium economy. For this upcoming trip to London, we ended up booking a Virgin Atlantic flight. I think the planes will be nicer, but on the other hand we'll have to change planes. Basically, there is just no great way to travel from Phoenix to Europe.

Hi Neighbor! Thanks for following along. I agree about the air travel options. My problem is that my DH really doesn't like flying long haul flights. I have to make it as convenient as possible for him, thus the BA non-stop. We flew to Copenhagen 3 years ago with SAS and had to fly to Dulles to change flights. It wasn't bad. Our neighbors flew directly to Barcelona with United and had to change flights in Newark on the way and Dulles on the return flight. Like you said, the airlines don't make it easy anymore. I definitely recommend going with the Premium Economy no matter who you fly with.

I hope my reports can help with your planning.

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 3 – London

Monday, July 2, 2018

I don’t know if anything could surpass the experience at Harry Pottery, but the plan today was to start using our London Pass and visit Westminster Abbey, The Churchill War Rooms, 10 Downing Street, HOHO bus to Harrods and Kensington Palace; ending the day with dinner in Leicester Square and Young Frankenstein at the Garrick Theater.

We had another good breakfast at the hotel before heading out. DH scoffed at me when I told him I wanted to be in line for Westminster Abbey by 8:30 AM. We walked by the Jewel Tower on our way.

The abbey opened at 9:30 AM, but the day before I saw the line wrap around the street to get in. We were about 15 people back from the entry gate when they let us in promptly at 9:00 AM. We lined up outside the side of Westminster Abbey as the line grew behind us and to the side where Fast Track tickets got priority. DH was glad we had arrived early!

Some of the detail on the exterior of the Abbey.

Soon we were let into the Abbey to show our London Pass and purchase timed entry tickets for £5.00 to the new Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Galleries that had just opened a couple of weeks before our visit. We had entry at 10:00 AM. There is no photography allowed in the Abbey, however, from the minute you walk in to the end you are surrounded by the most beautiful and ornate memorials, statues, grave sites, arches, etc. I installed the Westminster Abbey app on my cell phone and downloaded the tour. However, guided audio tours are available as part of your entry fee. My favorite part of the abbey was the The Lady Chapel. The ornateness of the beautiful ceiling and the light from the stained glass is breathtaking. I urge you to look it up.

At 10:00 AM we made our way to the special new entrance to the Gallery which sits high above the abbey itself. They cleverly built a special enclosed staircase outside the Abbey called the Weston Tower which consists of 12 small staircases surrounding an elevator up to the galleries.

Again, no photography allowed. It was simply breathtaking. It showcased Abbey history hidden away for years. Exhibits included wood carved effigies of monarchs, illustrated hand written documents, gold communion service pieces and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s marriage license. Also, it had great views looking down into the abbey itself. The gallery itself was surprisingly not crowded at all with maybe a couple of dozen of us up there, especially compared to the number of people below, so it was a nice respite from the crowds.

After the gallery we went back down to the abbey and continued our tour. We made sure to stop and view the scientists buried in the Abbey, including Sir Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin and most recently, Stephen Hawking’s. Unfortunately, we never made it out to the cloisters. We could have spent the whole day there, but had to move on.

We headed out of the Abbey at about 11:30 AM in search of The Churchill War Rooms.

We passed them a couple of days before, but got turned around and had to retrace our steps back to the Abbey until we headed down the right street. Unfortunately, by the time we got to the rooms, there was a 2-3 hour wait just to get in. Sadly, we decided to skip it and look for 10 Downing Street. Well, again after being turned around, we made our way to Whitehall and found 10 Downing Street. It wasn’t hard to miss as it had heavy gates and guards. We passed by the front of the Horse Guard museum where 2 mounted officers were standing guard.

We made it back to Trafalgar Square.

We were getting hungry, so we decided to eat lunch at Garfunkel’s at Trafalgar Square where we were able to sit down for a bit, eat a decent lunch and use the restrooms (or as they say in Europe, the toilets). I didn’t realize that Garfunkel’s was a big chain until we started seeing them all over London.

After lunch, we decided to use our HOHO ticket (came with the London Pass) for a tour of London, eventually making our way to Kensington. I wanted a quick tour of London, but I didn’t realize that we would get a 3 hour impromptu tour of the entire city.

We passed by the House Guards museum again.

You can see the security of 10 Downing Street.

We went past the County Hall and around to Waterloo Station. They were originally supposed to have a speed train from France come to the Waterloo station, but the French objected to the name of the station so the train was moved to another location.

We went back across the river, passing this interesting church and clock.

Statue of St. George slaying the Dragon

Another clock

St. Bride’s church, which steeple was said to inspire the tiered wedding cake.

St. Paul’s Cathedral.

The Monument. Designed by Christopher Wren and erected near the site of the start of the Great Fire of London in 1666. It is 202 Ft. high and is 202 feet from where the fire started in a bakery on Pudding Lane.

To be continued. . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 3 (continued)

We went over the Tower Bridge, passing the Tower of London,

Eventually we made our way back around to Westminster Abbey and Parliament.

Went back behind Buckingham Palace.

Wellington’s Arch

Marble Arch (Sorry for the blur, taken from a moving vehicle)

I couldn’t believe the amount of traffic. It was pretty much bumper to bumper the entire way through the west part of London.

We saw Harrod’s, but didn’t have time to stop.

Eventually we finally made it to Kensington. Unfortunately we didn’t see any Dukes, Duchesses or little princes or princess in residence.

We had no time for the palace tour. Instead, we took advantage of the café to get refreshment, use the restrooms and shop a little.

We then walked through a bit of Kensington Park before hopping back on the bus to go to Oxford Street, where we figured we had just enough time to get to the Disney Store and still make it to dinner and our show.

We headed back out towards Paddington, where Paddington Bear was “discovered”, and headed towards Oxford Street.

Unfortunately, the driver did not stop. Grrrr! We made our way through Piccadilly Circus. Oh, the humanity!

We got off the bus where we originally got on near the National Art Gallery and The Naval Church.

Our next destination goal was to find the Garrick Theater. After initially going the wrong way, we turned ourselves around again and eventually found it.

We still needed to eat dinner. Fortunately, there were a lot of restaurants very close to the theater, so we picked The Steak & Co. Not knowing really what to expect, we all ordered filet on the waiter’s recommendation, only to be surprised that it came out not completely cooked. Rather, it came out seared on a hot stone and you had to finish cooking it to your desire. You could choose from several flavored butters (to cook with), shakes (to season with) and sauces (to eat with). It was marvelous!

I also ordered a side of potato gratin, which was very good. We couldn’t pass up dessert. DH ordered bread pudding with ice cream, DD ordered sticky toffee pudding and I ordered Profiteroles with chocolate sauce. Yum!

After we paid the bill, we had about 15 minutes to literally walk across the street (which in London became an adventure in itself, holy cow!), pick up our tickets and find our seats before the show started. Whew!

Needless to say, we made it. The show was phenomenal! We enjoyed the original movie, but the musical was 10x more hilarious!! It was a bit bawdy though and did embarrass our DD a little. She got over it and enjoyed the show immensely as well. I laughed so hard, it was a nice finish to an otherwise frustrating touring day.

After the show, we grabbed a cab back to the hotel to prepare for another day in London.

Looking back, I’m glad we ended up taking the entire HOHO tour, because we saw a lot of things that we just wouldn’t have gotten around to seeing otherwise.

Next: The Tower and an arbitrary line.

 

[GuardMusic]

Day 2 - Continued

After we ate, we got to walk around their outside exhibit area. You’ve probably heard that the tour is where you can see Number 4 Privet Drive, The Knight Bus, Hogwarts Bridge, and Harry’s childhood home in Godrics Hollow. So that was super cool, and you learned about stuff like what materials the houses were made out of ,(plexi- glass with a lot of paint and texture layers if you are interested), and how they created the scene in the first movie where Harry had to grab his Hogwarts letter. I also got to sit in one of the models of the Angela Ford car from the 2nd movie, and Hagrid’s bike, used in several of the films.

I just want to say kudos for this detail of the HP Tour. I was leading a study abroad of freshman-senior university students in mid-May 2017. 90% of our group elected to do this tour, which ended up about 20 people. (Luckily, our day wasn't as busy as your photos.) Being college students they looked for the cheapest option, but I convinced them to also do the Golden Tour transportation option. Comparing that to the train/bus/walk, etc. option was a no-brainer. So we all definitely concur with this option!

It was an incredible & immersive experience as you describe. (I fear Universal won't compare? as I haven't been to that one yet.) Anyway, I can't wait to have an excuse to get back to London solely so I can take BFF on this experience as well!

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 4 – London

Tuesday, July 3, 2018

Our plan today was to take the HOHO bus to The Tower of London, visit Tower Bridge and take the water cruise to Greenwich.

After another lovely breakfast at the hotel, we went to look for the correct bus stop for the HOHO bus. The first bus was at 8:40 AM. We ended up walking almost to Westminster Abbey when we ran into one of the agents for The Original Tour Company. He exchanged my voucher for tickets and we waited a few minutes for the bus to arrive. I had hoped for a bus with live commentary, but we got the recording.

We passed a Twinings tea store.

We passed by St. Paul’s Cathedral again.

We crossed over the Tower Bridge on our way to the Tower of London.

My goal was to get to the Tower of London at 9:30 to beat the crowds. We arrived right at 10:00 AM, but since the traffic was as bad for everybody else, the crowds weren’t bad.

We had the London Pass, so we were able to get in quickly after a quick bag check. DH just wanted to start touring, so we didn’t take a tour by the Beefeater Yoeman Warders.

After walking by Traitor’s Gate,

and into the courtyard of the Tower.

the first place we headed was the Crown Jewel exhibit. DD told us that the line got really long later in the day (and she was right as we passed it later to find the line extending out of the queue). You can tell the jewels are in there because of the posted guards.

I’m glad we did. We didn’t wait more than 15 minutes and we were inside. They didn’t allow pictures, but you are wound around through rooms with displays showing how the various crowns and scepters came into existence or have been worn throughout the monarchy. It was very well done.

When you finally reach the huge vault and walk through the vault doors, there is a moving platform on either side of the display cases that you stand on while being taken by the crowns on display. There are platforms above that you can stand on after you go by, if you need more time to drool. Personally, while I found the crowns to be stunningly gorgeous, I was disappointed that we only saw the crowns, scepters, orbs and a few swords. It would have been nice to see some other royal jewelry, like tiaras, necklaces, rings, etc. I really enjoyed seeing more of the royal jewels in Copenhagen.

The Tower of London used to hold a menagerie of animals. Basically, it was London’s first zoo. All throughout the grounds, wire sculptures depicting the animals that were once housed there were displayed.

We also saw the infamous ravens. Legend has it that if the ravens ever left the tower, the tower would fall. So, to insure that doesn’t happen, the wings of the ravens are clipped. Still, it was cool to see them. They weren’t bothered by the people at all and they would pose for pictures.

We visited the White Tower,

the Torture room (very unimpressive according to DD), The Tower’s Mint, walked the Battlements

and ate lunch at their café. We left the Tower at about 12:45 PM. We decided that we wouldn’t have time to take the river cruise out to Greenwich if we did the Tower Bridge tour, so we exited the Tower and walked to the Tower of London Pier.

The Original Tour included a City Cruise river cruise to Greenwich and then back down to Westminster pier. The cruise was very informative and we had a live guide the entire way. He was very funny and pointed out some of the more interesting buildings along the way.

Tower Bridge

City of London, City Hall building.

HMS Belfast

The biggest yacht I have ever seen. It belongs to a London Billionaire.

The place where the Mayflower left London.

\

To be continued. . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 4 (Continued)

Once we arrived at Greenwich, we headed up (literally up a steep hill) to the Royal Observatory.

The view from the top is incredible.

This is where 0 Longitude is measured and you can stand in both hemispheres at the same time. We kept telling DD that 0 longitude could have been designated anywhere in the world and that Greenwich was just an arbitrary location because some English guy wanted to find a better way for sailors to navigate the ocean and Greenwich was the highest point around. As teenagers will do, she wasn’t having any of it!

This rare 24 hour clock greets visitors at the top.

Anyway, we took the obligatory pictures of us straddling the line and then proceeded to the museum.

Funny thing is that this was not the original Meridian line at all.

The museum had many time pieces developed by John Harrison over the years in order to keep proper time at sea. It was fascinating. The observatory also had a few telescopes.

We walked back down the hill to the National Maritime Museum and walked around a bit.

Next we visited the Queen’s House.

I had read about the Tulip Staircase there. It was the first spiral self-supporting staircase in England. I had also read about a technique for taking pictures of ceilings by putting your camera on the ground and using the timer, so I did it. Kind of a cool effect.

The other interesting room of note was the Great Hall, which was designed as perfect cube.

Otherwise the house was mostly an art gallery.

DH headed over to the Cutty Sark, but it had already closed for the day. We decided then to take the cruise back to Westminster and find some dinner.

We saw the O2, once known as the Millennium Dome, it is now used as a multipurpose facility for soccer and concerts. You may remember it from the 2012 London Olympic Games.

The current (and third) London Bridge. Fun fact, the second London Bridge is actually in Arizona.

The river side of Traitor Gate.

If you followed the World Cup, you know England was in it. They were playing for a Quarter Final slot that night against Colombia. Well, everybody in London was at a pub to watch the game. We tried several near Westminster with no luck. DD had remembered seeing a pub on the way to our hotel, kind of off the beaten path. We tried it and had luck. We ate at the Marquis of Granby.

Dining is usually on the second floor and we had a nice view overlooking the street.

Being at a pub, we had to try traditional English pub food, so I had Fish & Chips and DD and DH had their meat pies, which was their specialty. The meal was quite good. We ended up conversing with an American couple who were heading to the Baltic for a cruise the next day out of Dover. A couple times while eating we would hear a cheer raise up from the pub below and knew that England must have done something good. They ended up beating Colombia and going to the quarter finals.

After dinner, we made the short walk back to our hotel for the night.

Next: Where’s the Queen?

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 5 – London

Wednesday, July 4, 2018

Today’s plan was to take a walking tour offered through The Original Tour Company to watch the changing of the guards at Buckingham Palace, the British Museum and Covent Gardens.

We had another good breakfast at the hotel and set out to walk the 25 minutes to Trafalgar Square along Whitehall to meet up with our walking tour.

Now, you’d think after walking around London for 3 days and taking several routes around the city on a HOHO bus, that we would be able to find out way around? Well, you’d be wrong. Anyway, we found Trafalgar Square with no problem, but we could not find, for the life of us, the Original Tour Company office. We asked one of their sale agents and his response was “across from Canada House.” Right! Well, we must have walked around Canada House a couple of times getting more and more frustrated, until we saw, under a ton of scaffolding, across the street an i in a blue circle (indicating the office). I swear, I have never seen so much construction in one city in my life. Well, we joined up with the tour just as they were leaving the building.

We had a great tour guide named Paul who told us several funny stories on our way to Buckingham Palace. He asked if any Americans were in the group, and of course there were. In a very sarcastic, snarky way (which was really funny) he wished us all a “Happy Independence Day!” He then proceeded to point out The Admiralty where the British found we were seeking our independence.

He told us about Admiralty Arch and the Queen’s Gate which only opens when the Queen goes through (except when they open it to film movies)

and the Statue of the Duke of York (where the Duke docked money out of the soldiers salaries to fund the statue).

He showed us the statues for Queen Elizabeth’s parents, King George VI and the Queen Elizabeth (affectionaly known as The Queen Mum) in front of Clarence House.

We walked down The Mall towards St. James Palace where the new guards were coming to replace the old guards at the palace.

We then went through St. James Park

to the Wellington Barracks, where we saw some more guards on their way to the Palace.

We then went back through the garden to an area with a raised terrace to see the actual Palace, when somebody asked our guide if the Queen was in residence. He told us that she usually was on Wednesdays before heading back to Windsor for the weekend, but her flag was not flying above the Palace. He said, she must have gone back to Windsor early. I overhead another tour guide say the same thing. The funny thing was that even I knew that the Queen was actually in Scotland. Don’t these guides listen to the news! HA HA

We didn’t actually see the changing of the guard in front of the Buckingham Palace, we eventually saw the changing of the guard back at St. James Palace. Nothing too exciting. Afterwards we waited for the crowds to thin out and saw the old guard return to their barracks.

We met a celebrity horse (the one on the left) who was part of the Queen’s Jubilee and Harry and Meghan’s wedding.

He took us back to St. James Palace where we saw where Prince Louis would be christened later in the week.

To be continued. . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 5 (Continued)

We hung out and got some pictures of St. James Park and the palace.

and then headed towards Oxford Street and DD’s nirvana – The Disney Store! Her ultimate goal is to visit as many European Disney Stores as she can. This would be her 3rd. She’d previously been to stores in Copenhagen and Venice.

It was about a 25 minute walk through Green Park

and upper scale neighborhoods like Berkeley Square and Grosvenor Square. We arrived on Oxford Street and found the store.

We purchased some England related Disney souvenirs.

By this time, we were hungry so we looked for a place to eat. There were several places across the street, so we headed that way and discovered The Spaghetti House. It was nice to sit down to a hot meal and take a breather. We had fried zucchini and I had spaghetti. It was really good.

After lunch, we hailed a cab to the British Museum. After a short drive, we arrived and got in line to get our bags checked. As with most National museums in London, the British Museum had free admission, but did ask for a donation of £5.

The building was amazing. Once you got through the main foyer,

you go out into center courtyard and a sweeping staircases up to the upper exhibits.

DD really wanted to see the Rosetta Stone

and Greek Statues. Unfortunately, several of the pieces had been removed for a special Rodin exhibit that you had to pay to see. Go figure!

Rodin

To be continued. . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 5 (Continued)

The museum was incredible, even though it was very warm and very crowded. We walked through several exhibits including the Easter Island display and the Egyptian display.

Early Roman History

They also had displays on timepieces and currency.

Funny side note: We stopped to have a snack. While we were sitting at a table eating, we noticed a girl behind us wearing an Arizona State University shirt (DH and I are alumi). We made a comment to her and her parents said that they were from Arizona. Their son had just graduated high school as well. We asked where he went and they said Hamilton, which is in Chandler. Wow, we are from Chandler too! What a small world. ​

While eating I was able to check in for our flight to Barcelona the following day.

We left the museum and found the stop for the HOHO bus that would take us to Covent Garden where we planned to eat dinner. We passed through Piccadilly Square again.

On the way to Covent Garden, we passed back through Piccadilly and the Palace Theater where “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child” was being performed. DD couldn’t go to the show, so I guess seeing the theater was the next best thing!

After arriving at the Garden, our main objective was to find Waterstones Bookstore. When DD was in London last year, she purchased the 20th Anniversary edition of “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” with her house (Gryffindor) cover. Of course, this year she wanted to get the 20th Anniversary edition of “The Chamber of Secrets”.

After her success, we walked amongst the market stalls and saw several performers on the square.

Also in the square, Balthazar, a local bakery and American Pie Shop was sponsoring a pie throwing booth.

DH spotted a restaurant decked out in red, white and blue and went to check it out. It was a BBQ restaurant so we decided to have 4th of July dinner at Maxwell’s. It was good, but not as good as home.

We stopped for gelato (which was to be our first of many on this trip) before taking a cab back to the hotel to pack and get ready to travel in the morning.

London was not what I expected. It was a faster paced, more crowded, navigationaly frustrating and sites were closer together than I envisioned. Yet, there is no place like London for their history. The people we encountered were all very nice. The places we visited were fascinating, and I wish we could have seen more. So for now, thank you London, hope to see you again someday.

Next: Hola Barcelona!

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 6 – Travel & Barcelona

Thursday, July 5, 2018

Our time in London had come to an end. According to my DCL App, we had 1 day and hours before our cruise!

Eddie Manning’s car service was picking us up at 7:40 AM to take us to the airport for our 10:50 AM flight to Barcelona. We had one last breakfast when the restaurant opened at 6:30 AM.

After breakfast we gathered all of our bags and went to the lobby, a little before 7:40 AM, a driver approached us. It was Eddie Manning himself to drive us to the airport. He was very personable and offered candy and water to us in the car. We talked with him as he drove us out of the city. DD was fascinated because Eddie had once driven around the cast of Harry Potter, more specifically Rupert Grint.

We passed this very interesting Michelin Tire dealership.

We made it to the airport in plenty of time. We checked in our bags (one great thing about flying economy plus is that we each get 2 checked bags for free, the even greater thing is that it transferred to all of our legs, even if we were flying regular coach, like when we flew between London and Barcelona). We went through security, but DD wasn’t aware she had to remove her iPad (she went through Pre-Check in PHX) and I forgot to remind her, so she had to have her bag searched and go through additional screening. Live and learn.

When you leave from Terminal 3 in London, you are all funneled in to one big area after security. It looks like a mini mall with all of the duty free designer stores and restaurants. I had wanted to buy some shortbread cookies from Harrods, but since we didn’t stop there, I decided to get some at the airport. Unfortunately, I bought some shortbread at the first store I saw them at. I discovered later that Harrod’s had a store in the airport and had shortbread there. Oh well, I’d catch them on the way back. We bought some water and DD grabbed some tea from the Nero Café. At Heathrow, your gate assignment is not announced until about an hour before your flight. Once our gate was announced we made our way to the gate and boarded our plane to Barcelona. The flight was scheduled to be about 2 hours 10 minutes, but we would lose an hour when we arrived.

Our flight was uneventful and arrived early at about 2:00 PM.

Our path to Barcelona.

This time we deplaned onto a jet way and made our way through the hallways to passport control where we encountered another line.

I had arranged transportation from the airport to the DCL Hotel (Hilton Diagonal Mar) through DCL. As we were waiting for our bags from the carousel, we were approached by a DCL agent who verified our identity. He was very nice, got us a luggage cart and told us our driver was waiting for us.

We had a very nice driver who helped take our luggage to the minivan and proceeded to take us to our hotel. It took about 45 minutes from the time we landed until we were in our car. As we were driving to the airport, we noticed some odd buildings and statues on the side of a mountain next to the road.

We later found out that it was the cemetery.

We arrived at our hotel about 40 minutes later. At around 3:30 PM I was checking in to our room. Meanwhile, DH stopped by the DCL Hospitality Desk to check in with them. Hilton also had a welcome letter for DCL passengers.

We were in a deluxe room, 604, with a roll away for our DD.

It was an interesting room to say the least. There was a window in the bathroom just above the tub

The shower door never quite closed right and the shower head sprayed toward the wall.

It had a mini-bar refrigerator, but I couldn’t open the door to put DD’s insulin in. We had to call guest services on that one.

The other 6 people in our party had all arrived in Barcelona earlier in the day. I had texted our neighbor to tell her we had arrived. She told me that everybody was meeting for dinner at a tapas place in town. We were happy to join them.

DJ, DT and DR had all set out to explore Barcelona already. The other 6 of us were going to take a cab and meet them. Our neighbor’s DD is in a wheelchair. You have to understand that they don’t have big cars, and I rarely saw an SUV, in Europe. Even mini-van cabs are not that readily available. At about 4:00 PM, we hailed a cab outside the hotel for the 6 of us and 1 wheelchair. The cab was about the size of a Honda CRV. Our driver insisted that he could fit us all. Well he did, but we had to totally dismantle the wheelchair. There were 2 of us in the back, 3 of us in the middle and 1 up front. DD had to hold one of the wheels.

We made it to the restaurant, Cerveceria Catalana. I wish I had thought to take pictures of the menu or at least the restaurant. The first thing we ordered was Sangria, because that’s what you do in Barcelona, right?

It was very good and refreshing. We started ordering our sangria and tapas, or small plates, when the other 3 arrived. For a first meal in Barcelona, it couldn’t be beat. We had shrimp, beef, calamari, and potatoes, among other dishes that were simply fabulous.

After dinner, we were full and decided to walk around Barcelona a bit.

We made our way to the Block of *******, where 3 Modernista architects tried to outdo each other for the best facade.

Casa Amatller

Casa Batllo

We walked further admiring the architecture.

To be continued. . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

We found our way to the Gothic quarter, where we stumbled upon the Disney Store. Eureka, #4 for DD!

DNM loved Peter Pan flying over Barcleona.

After picking up some Barcelona Disney souvenirs, we continued on.

We came to the Roman Fountain, with blue and yellow tilework. According to Rick Steves, “In the 17th century this was the last watering stop for horses before leaving town.” Looks like a pretty fancy horse trough to me!

We then made it to Plaza Nova. There are 2 Roman towers that surround the main entrance.

The Cathedral of Barcelona is also in this plaza. There was a fairly good size music ensemble on the steps of the cathedral and several people dancing the Sardana, the official dance of Barcelona. Basically, the people link hands and slowly dance in a circle with their belongings in the middle so everybody can keep an eye on them. Anybody is welcome to join the circle.

We continued walking along the Carrer Del Bosbe

and encountered the Pont Gotic Bridge. It reminded me of the Bridge of Sighs in Venice.

We strolled along looking at the architecture, heading in the general direction of our hotel.

We ran into some Roman ruins preserved under a building.

and made it to the beach.

By this time, the sun was starting to set, and we considered getting a cab, but DNDD was asleep in her chair which made moving her to a cab more difficult, so we carried on. About 2 hours and 4 miles later we finally spotted our hotel just as it was getting dark.

It was about 9:45 PM and it had been a long day and we were all ready to turn in.

Next: Gaudi’s Barcelona

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Thank you loyal readers for sticking with me. Please bear with me, I have one more day in Barcelona and then we get on the Magic!!!!

 

[Alohagirl73]

Enjoying your trip report. Thanks for sharing.

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 7 – Barcelona

Friday, July 6, 2018

The plan today was to tour Barcelona. I had scheduled a 4 hour city tour with Barcelona Day Tours. The tour would include a tour of the city, Montjuic and Park Guell. Our guide was to pick us up from our hotel at 9:00 AM and drop us at La Sagrada Familia at about 1:00 PM. We purchased tickets separately for a guided tour of the basilica for 3:15 PM.

Note: If you plan independent tours in the Mediterranean, be prepared to pay cash in Euros upon completion of your tour. They will take your credit card, but will charge you up towards a 12% processing fee.​

Since we booked our rooms through DCL, a buffet breakfast was included. It was a very big breakfast with traditional meats, cheeses, fruits, pastries, eggs, etc. You could even get fresh squeezed orange juice.

After breakfast, we met up the rest of our party in the lobby and met our guide Javier. Our driver was Guillermo. We had a small touring van with room for DNM’s wheel chair.

We headed out towards the center of town, past the Christopher Columbus statue.

We passed by the old Bull Fighting Arena, which is now a mall, as bull fighting is now illegal in Barcelona.

We passed these Venetian Towers, which were modeled after the towers of St. Marks Basilica in Venice

on our way up to Montjuic. This was where the Olympic stadium was built. Montjuic can also be reached by an aerial tram from down near the port.

The view from on top of the hill was amazing! They do a water show at night with the fountain shown, but we didn’t see it.

There were vendors setting up their wares everywhere on the ground. They were selling everything from handheld fans, paintings, hats, knock off purses and water.

There was a palace that is now an art museum.

After enjoying the view and dodging vendors selling water bottles, we got back in the van and drove past the Olympic Stadium and torch.

Javier took us to another overlook.

Here is the aerial tram.

There is a statue of the traditional dance of Barcelona.

We had a view overlooking the port where the Magic would be the next day!

And another great view of the city.

You could even see La Sagrada Familia

We went back down in the city and passed the Lobster Structure, which we had walked by the night before.

Next, we went to look at Gaudi’s apartments.

We started with Casa Batllo.

Then Casa Mila. The details on this building are amazing. Gaudi was very religious and loved organic designs. Gaudi wanted it to look like the sea. The balconies were designed to look like seaweed. He also included his signature 4 sided (3D) cross on the roof.

Even the sidewalk tile carried the sea motif.

We loaded the van once again and went to Park Guell. DH got a kick that basically the park got started as a residential development that failed as nobody bought into it. The only people that lived there were the wealthy owner of the land and Gaudi. It was given to the city on the condition that it became a public park. It was totally public until the Monumental Zone was in danger of being damaged, so they started charging admission. La Sagradia Familia actually operates this part of the park.

We started walking through the free part.

This was Gaudi’s house and is now a museum.

This was part of the landowner’s home

To be continued. . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 7 (Continued)

Then you get to the Monumental Zone. Tickets are required and are time entry based so they limit the number of people there at any given time.

It was truly whimsical, colorful and beautiful.

This looked like the witch’s house in Hansel and Gretel, which was the idea.

Here’s another one.

Then there is the staircase.

The details on the tiles were amazing.

The view from the top.

The top.

Then you would climb up some more to the mosaic tiled benches.

We then made our way out of the park. Even the fences around the park have an organic feel.

To be continued. . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 7 (Continued)

After the park, Javier took us to La Sagrada Familia. I was really looking forward to seeing this after hearing so much about it from our neighbors. It blew away all of my expectations. Javier took us around the exterior giving us a simple history and explanation of the 3 facades. It was a wonderful tour and I highly recommend Barcelona Day Tours. They were really easy to communicate with and allowed us to add 2 more people on short notice.

Javier recommended a tapas place for lunch and another place for gelato for dessert right around the corner, and then let us go.

The tapas place was really cool. They had a counter where they had cold tapas. You would go up and select the ones you wanted. They brought hot tapas around to our table. All the tapas were the same price (€1.25). Each tapa had a stick and you were charged by how many sticks you had at the end of your meal. The tapas were really good!

Side Note: We saw a guy wearing a Northern Arizona University shirt eating in the restaurant and we asked him if he went to school there, he said he did, but he was studying abroad in Barcelona. DD is attending NAU in the fall. It truly is small world.​

Afterwards, we got our Gelato and went to the park on the Passion side of the basilica to eat it before making our way to the front for our tour.

When it was time to go in, we entered the queue for security. We were asked to go to another line because of the wheel chair and they took an elevator to the meeting place of the tour.

We received our radio receivers for the guided tour and went on our way.

Our guide was wonderful and explained the history of the basilica and the design and architecture behind it. We found out that they hope to have the basilica finished in 8 years to coincide with 100th anniversary of Gaudi’s death.

We were shown a model showing what is already complete and what needs to be done yet. The grey is completed, the yellow needs to be finished yet.

She then explained the faced itself with the scenes of the nativity and Jesus’s childhood.

We entered through the Hope or Nativity façade.

The large doors looked like leaves and small sculptures of insects, butterflies, frogs, etc. could be found.

When you enter the actual cathedral, the first thing you notice is the light.

It is surrounding you everywhere. The 52 columns, which represented each Sunday in a year, reminded you of tree trunks, of branching at the top to hold the extremely high ceiling up. The stained glass windows all represent either local shrines, saints or scripture. The Nativity side has the sun rising through the windows, while the Passion side has the sun setting through the windows. Either way, the windows were simply gorgeous and my pictures do not do it justice. It is something that must be seen in person.

You can take elevators up to a couple of the towers and walk down the staircases.

After gawking over the windows, our guide explained the large door that would someday grace the main entrance of the basilica when the Glory façade is finished. The doors were placed there so that the Pope could go through them when he came to the basilica.

She then took us out through the Passion façade which is the most recently completed, as you can tell by the color of the stone. This represents Jesus’s crucifixion and death. A different architect designed this façade with its stark angles.

The fruit on the top of the towers represent the elements of the Eucharist and use Gaudi’s signature tile mosaic work.

After the tour, we went through the museum and the gift shop.

Then we took cabs back to the hotel. We had some time before dinner, so DJ, DT and I went across the street to a mall which had a grocery store. I needed to get some emergency snacks for DD and the others were in search of beer and wine. It was interesting shopping in a store that is laid out like any grocery store here in the states, but everything is in Spanish. You think you might know where you might find certain things, only for them not be there. It was like a scavenger hunt. Anyway, mission accomplished and we headed back to the hotel.

Side Note: As you may remember, my DD is a Type 1 diabetic. Every once in a while her blood sugar will drop to a dangerous level and she needs to eat fast acting sugar to bring it up: such as juice, soda, candy, Gummies, etc. Well, one thing we discovered in Europe is that they do not put as much sugar in their foods as we do in America. Therefore, we had a real hard time finding anything with enough sugar (generally 15 carbs) to use as an emergency snack. For instance, regular Coca-Cola only had about 10 carbs per bottle. In the States, it’s closer to 30 carbs. So she ended up having to eat double the amount she regularly would.​

The concierge recommended a good Mediterranean food restaurant, La Fonda, for dinner back in town.

We ordered sangria again, which was very good. Some ordered very Mediterranean food like paella and squid with black rice. I stayed more traditional and ordered English Pot Roast in Mushroom sauce, which was excellent! The food was good, but the service was a bit slow.

After dinner, we walked to the Columbus Statue and grabbed a cab back to the hotel.

We had a wonderful time in Barcelona and I was pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed it after London. At no time did we feel unsafe or threatened by the infamous pick pockets and everybody we encountered was very friendly. While people in Barcelona prefer to speak Catalonian, we had no problem using the little Spanish we knew.

Adios Barcelona and muchos gracias! Tomorrow, we were finally getting on board the Magic!

Next: Adventures in doing Laundry!

 

[scrappydew]

I loved hearing about your London adventures - we are just back from our England trip and it sparked pleasant memories. Thanks for sharing!

 

[disneyfaninaz]

I loved hearing about your London adventures - we are just back from our England trip and it sparked pleasant memories. Thanks for sharing!

Thank you so much for reading. I'm glad you enjoyed London!

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Thanks for sticking with me, we are finally boarding!

Day 8 – All aboard the Disney Magic

Saturday, July 7, 2018

The day had finally arrived according to my DCL app! Yahoo!!

In fact, the app was ready for me to put my next sail date in. I was disappointed when they did away with the suitcase countdown on the old app, but I love the new one with the character flip cards.

Since our luggage had to be ready by 8:00 AM to be picked up from our room, we were up early and ready for breakfast before 8:00. After another wonderful breakfast, we went back up to our room to relax before we needed to be in the lobby to catch our bus to the port at 11:15 AM.

Now, by this time, we have already been on the road for a week, so we had some dirty laundry accumulated. I always pack a small duffle bag to carry home souvenirs that don’t fit in our luggage. Well, I pulled it out and loaded it with dirty laundry. My hope was to get some laundry started as soon as we were allowed in our stateroom. Best laid plans and all.

After our luggage was picked up, we headed down to the lobby to check out and wait for our bus. Our neighbors had been taken separately to the port in a van due to the wheelchair. The other 6 of us waited for the bus.

It was an uneventful ride to the port before we spotted the Magic. Isn’t she beautiful! There were at least 6 other cruise ships in port that day.

We arrived in a large parking area in front of the terminal a little before noon.

We got into a short line to show our passports and DCL paperwork.

Once inside, we went through security and then up an escalator into the reception area where we waited in a short line to check in.

We were handed the “have you been sick” form and I filled it out while we waited. We also got our first Navigator of the cruise.

Soon, we were checking in, getting our group picture taken and receiving our KTTW cards and gold lanyards.

We found our neighbors (who are platinum) waiting for us in the terminal. Once the biggest boarding number (16) of our group was called at about 12:20 PM, we all made our way to get our group photo taken and then onto the ship. By 12:30, we started down the gang plank to get on our beloved ship for our 10 night adventure.

I love hearing my family’s name welcomed onboard. I missed that on our last cruise.

Since we were on the Magic last, they discontinued the buffet in what used to be Carioca’s. Now it is a sit down lunch in Lumiere’s. We decided to make our way up to Cabanas for lunch. One of the CMs found us some tables outside on deck 9 that would fit all of us, a wheelchair and all of our carry-ons. By 12:50 PM, I was peeling my shrimp!

After eating and setting everybody up on each other’s DCL App so we can chat together, it was soon 1:30 PM. We walked down the 2 flights of stairs to deck 7 and room 7120, which would be our home for the next 10 nights.

To be continued . . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 8 (Continued)

The first thing I did was grab my bag of laundry to head to the laundry room on deck 7. I admit, I haven’t done a lot of laundry on the ships, and it has changed since the last time I did laundry. I made it to the laundry room and all of the washing machines had red lights. I assumed that they were all being used. I went down to deck 6 and found the same thing. I went back to our stateroom defeated. After a little while, I decided to try it again. This time I discovered the screen that you bought laundry tokens for the washer, dryer and detergent. The great thing about this screen is that it told you if machines were available in each of the 3 laundry rooms. The good news: there was a washing machine available. The bad news: laundry was still in it. I waited for the person to come and move their laundry. However, some people weren’t so patient and started moving people’s laundry from the dryers to the limited amount of folding tables in the laundry room. Personally, I didn’t want to handle other people’s laundry. One guy in particular made himself the laundry room commander and was telling everybody what to do. If you didn’t want to move laundry, he would and the take the machine for himself. Several of us waiting for machines were somewhat taken aback by his behavior. Anyway, long story short, I was able to get not only the load I brought on board, but a couple of other loads done after we got our luggage throughout the afternoon. A new feature on the DCL app is that it will notify you when your washer or dryer is done. It will also tell you which machine in which laundry room. That was nice, as I had multiple machines in multiple rooms going.

Between checking for open machines and checking to see if our luggage arrived (so far, mine was the only one that had) we probably explored the ship. I can’t really remember now.

Our muster drill was in Animator’s Palate at 4:30 PM. I could have sworn that they were at 4:00 in the past.

Oh well. After the drill, I went to check on laundry and went to our room to see if our luggage had arrived. They had, so we then headed to deck 9 for the Adventure’s Away party.

Leslie Dallas from the US was our cruise director.

I was so disappointed. When it was time to blow my beloved horn, we got 3 short blasts instead. WHAT???? Anyway, as hard as it is to believe, I never did hear my beloved horn for the entire cruise. At a little after 5:00 PM, DH and I felt the ship moving so went to Deck 10 to watch us leave the port and watch the CMs waiving their white gloves at us.

We then went back to the room to get ready for dinner. On our way we took some pictures of Barcelona and the ship.

Our dining rotation for the cruise was LARLARLARL. We had main dining, so dinner was at 6:00 PM. Our first dinner was at Lumiere’s. I love what they make out of the napkins.

Here is the menu for “Let the Magic Begin” menu.

Warning: I am not one to take too many photos of food, but I tried to make an effort to take pictures of the menus and what I ate. I did good some nights, and not so good other nights. I apologize in advance for those of you who like food porn.​

I ordered the Chicken Bastilla, Clam Chowder, and Grilled Strip Loin. All were very good. I was especially surprised by the Chicken Bastilla, it was delicious.

I skipped dessert. Remember, I told you that we were celebrating DD’s birthday and DH and my 25th Anniversary. Before our dessert order was taken, our head server, Cedomir, brought over 2 celebration cakes and buttons to celebrate tonight. He also had a few of the servers come over and sing to us.

So, as shown on the Bon Voyage Navigator, and as you are all aware, DCL was doing their funky show scheduling on this cruise. Tonight’s “Be Our Guest” show was only being shown once at 7:30 PM. As is usually the case on the first night of a cruise, dinner ran past 7:30 PM. Needless to say, we did not see the show. We went shopping instead. On our last cruise to Norway, I was upset that DCL ran out of inaugural Norway shirts in the most popular sizes within 2 hours of the ship leaving port. Really, Disney? Anyway, I got my shirt 8 weeks later. I didn’t want a repeat, so we went immediately to the stores. Fortunately, they had Mediterranean shirts, but other Mediterranean merchandise was in short supply and 30% off. I did manage to get a shirt, a pin and an ornament. DH also got a nice polo and DD got a couple of shirts. In fact, we spent the minimum amount ($118) to get the VAT refund form. More on that later. One cool thing they had was their specially priced merchandise with purchase. It was a really nice DCL Europe 2018 backpack. We ended up getting it and using it for all of our excursions.

After shopping, we ran into DNC on the way back to our stateroom. We had both booked the 9 night Alaskan Disney cruise for next summer. We both wanted to shop our reservations to take advantage of the on-board booking discount and OBB credit. The Disney Vacation Planning desk was open until 10:00 PM and had nobody waiting. We both went back to our rooms to get our paperwork and then went back to the desk.

I found our first towel animal on our bed.

The sun was setting.

By the time, DNC and I made it back to the Planning Desk, there was somebody there. They have a new log in system, similar to taking a number to be the next helped. We used our KTTW card to check in, but we didn’t wait long and we were rebooking our Alaska cruise. I ended up saving about $1300.

It had been a long, exciting day. We had an excursion for the next day in Marseille and we had to meet our group at 7:45 AM. Needless to say, we called it a night.

Next: Bon Jour France!