Cruising on the Mediterranean Ocean

I took a cruise with my two grown daughters on the Norwegian Epic recently. We had such a wonderful time! I thought it might be interesting to share some of my photos here on my blog with you. For anyone who hasn't cruised, DO! They treated us like Queens from the moment we arrived until the day we disembarked. Our stateroom steward cleaned our room in the morning and came back in the evening while we were out eating dinner to turn down the beds and leave fresh towels, as well as make cute little towel animals and leave them on  the bed! We had room service (free of charge), meals with more food than you could possibly get down (free of charge), and lots of things to do. 

My daughters took tours in Pisa, Italy to see the "Leaning Tower", Rome to see well....Rome, and Pompeii. I didn't get off the ship because of my back and the back pain had been so much worse in Spain because I couldn't wear my pain patches in the extreme heat there and the same thing would apply in Pisa, Rome, and Pompeii. So while the girls were off doing the tours I had my hair done, had 3 acupuncture treatments (never had that before), watched a couple of movies on our large flat screen TV in our stateroom, and wondered around the ship....oh, and had delightful room service for breakfast and for lunch one day! 

OK, here we go with the pictures... Oh, for those of you who don't know, we cruised down the "boot" of Italy and back to Barcelona, Spain. OH, and they are going to be completely out of order because blogger.com seems to be having a problem with what I want to upload tonight!

Towel Elephant made by our cabin Steward

Towel Bunny made by our cabin Steward

Almost complete sunset on the Mediterranean Ocean

Beginning sunset on the Mediterranean Ocean

Early morning in Lavorno, Italy - we are coming in to port

The Bridge on the Norwegian Epic

Pools and hot tubs

Sitting area

Main area chandalier

Another chandalier

Looking down over our balcony, seeing the life boats below and water going by at night

Other ships around the port of Barcelona when we left there.

Staircase which was used for going from deck to deck. Each floor was a different color.

A view of the Norwegian Cruise Ship the EPIC in the Barcelona harbor.  A Beautiful ship with great crew members !

Well, all the photos for tonight. I'm exhausted from walking all over the Louvre in Paris today!! It was amazing and I'll have photos of that for you in a future blog. Have a wonderful day!

Huggs, Janie

MAGIC FOUNTAIN IN BARCELONA, SPAIN

My daughters and I decided to go see the Magic Fountain the last night we were in Barcelona. We were dropped off at the beginning of the drive-way/road up to the large water fountain on the other end. It was night as the show is played every 1/2 hour from 9:30 pm until about 11:30 pm. Along this road are smaller fountains, with white lights.

Waterfalls along the sidewalk

As we got closer to the large fountain we saw thousands of people around the fountain and even up the hillside around small (?) waterfalls and below the large fountain were more small waterfalls.

Waterfalls on hillside

Waterfalls on hillside

Small waterfalls below the fountain

Just as we arrived to right at the side of the Magic Fountain the water started to rise, in different colors and patterns as classical music played. You could hear the Oh's and Ah's all around as the water fountain show commenced. Below are a few pictures which really don't give it justice, but it's better than not showing you anything. 

Water Fountain with the waterfalls on the hillside behind

Something very moving happened to me during this show. We were all standing there and during the show people would go up closer to the water and their friends/family would take photos of them. All of a sudden a woman, about my age, came up to me and handed me her camera. With hand signals she motioned to me to take her picture in front of the fountain. I nodded in understanding and agreement. I took her photo and she returned to me to get her camera. Then the unexpected....she took my hand in her's and lightly squeezed and looked at me with the most kind expression of thanks! It was such a moving experience as I knew, that even though she did not speak my "spoken language", she spoke the language of friendship...even momentary...between two women. I shall always remember that.

Thank you, Barcelona, for a magical evening! Janie

Barcelona Tour Bus and Flamingo Dance Theater

Hi All, So here is a blog coming to you from Europe. My two grown daughters and I are on a wonderful trip together....

There was a tour bus system set up in Barcelona, Spain so that you could get on the bus and then get off anywhere you wanted to as long as you held onto the ticket and then you could get back on the next tour bus when you were ready to move on. We wanted to see "all" of Barcelona and thought this might be the easiest thing to do.

COURTYARD WITH FOUNTAIN - LOOKED LIKE IT WAS  PART OF A MONASTERY.

CROSS IN THE SAME COURTYARD

When we approached the waterfront there were two cruise ships in the port and we got so excited but our cruise ship wasn’t in port yet. (We went on a 7-day Cruise on the Mediterranean down Italy's "boot" - more on another blog). It was wonderful to finally see the ocean (Mediterranean Ocean). Our destination this day was the aquarium. There were throngs of people in there even though it was a week-day. There were a lot of European tourists around us all the time, speaking multiple languages. It was really amazing to see so many tourists with hardly anyone speaking any kind of English.

In the evening we went to a Flamingo Dinner Theater. This was held in an older part of Barcelona where some of the original buildings have been refurbished and where you have to pay a fee to get in, unless you have a reservation for the dinner theater. When we got there it was still daylight. This area is called the Spanish Village.

AS WE ENTERED THE SPANISH VILLAGE AREA.

MY TWO BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTERS, LISABETH ON LEFT AND TAMARA ON RIGHT

THIS IS RIGHT OUTSIDE OF THE ENTRANCE TO THE FLAMINGO DANCER DINNER THEATER

THIS AREA IS FILLED WITH SHOPS WHERE PEOPLE ARE MAKING AND SELLING THEIR ARTISTIC THINGS...A FEW DEMONSTRATIONS WERE GOING ON WHEN WE WERE THERE

A NICE VIEW OF THE BELL TOWER IN THE BACK WITH AN OLD  WATERFALL TYPE AREA

The dinner was very good as you can see from these pictures.

MY DESSERT: CARAMELIZED APPLES WITH WHIPPED CREAM, OF COURSE!

MY MAIN COURSE: SLICED BEEF IN A WINE SAUCE WITH MASHED  POTATOES

MY DAUGHTERS FIRST COURSE: GAZPACHO!

MY DAUGHTERS MAIN COURSE: TROUT OVER SHRIMP WITH BOILED POTATOES

MY FIRST COURSE: PEAR SALAD WITH PROSCHUTO ON TOP (forgive my spelling...only the spanish disctionary comes up here!!!!)

MY SOUP: VEGETABLE (and it was soooooo good!!!!)

The Flamingo dancers were absolutely spectacular! They were so intense! This type of dancing seems to be more “heel” dancing, It is really fascinating to watch and I will upload some video clips to Facebook of the dancing. Here are some still shots.

THE PEOPLE AT THE MICS IN THE BACK SANG  IN SPANISH  WHILE THE DANCERS WERE PERFORMING

All-in-all the evening was beautiful and interesting and YUMMY!!! Here are a couple night shots of the Spanish Village.

SPANISH VILLAGE AT NIGHT

I hope you are enjoying seeing Barcelona through my eyes. Janie

More from Barcelona, Cruise Starts Today

One of the things I have noticed is that people are the same the world over. Mannerisms, and many more things are so common in all cultures. Barcelona is a melting pot of European and some American people coming together for work, tourism, or whatever. It is always "moving". When we leave our hotel it seems like we are stepping into a carnival atmosphere. There are people on the street trying to sell you something, People singing and marching around like a parade. It is so odd. There was an announcement in a store the other night and i had no idea what was being said....and it didn't matter. 

Some Sort of Creature. Along the Ramblas

A woman angel. Along the Ramblas.

Same Angel Lady.

The Ramblas is the center of the tourist area. It is several blocks long and there is activity there all day and half the night. It is very interesting in terms of people-watching. 

Along the waterfront.

Along the waterfront.

We took a bus tour down to the waterfront. It is quite a ride from our hotel, but worth it. The palm trees are beautiful and the water is blue. It's so beautiful!!

A modern apartment building.

I will be off-line for the next 7 days because I 'll be on a cruise ship. After that I'll be in Paris for a week and promise to upload more beautiful pictures.

Janie

Hello from Spain!!

It's been a while since I wrote anything here and I have a few minutes so thought I would get started. This is a typical "ally" or walkway where people and cars share the same space. There are millions of people here so this picture is unusual because usually it is filled with people. Basically, the city seems quite clean, but there are people who don't care and throw paper or whatever on the ground. There are people who go around with brooms and dust pans cleaning up. 

There is graffitti everywhere, and it is sometimes hard to tell from the "street art". This woman's face was particularly interesting to me. It and the graffitti are on a metal door that the shops close at night. When they reopen in the morning, up goes the door (like a garage door) and that makes the entrance to the shop. 

This is a typical license plate in Barcelona. There are a lot of smart cars here....some just tiny!!!! 

Barcelona may be a city of 4 million people and maybe 1 million tourists, but there is a lot of greenery all  around. There are lots of trees and parks, with a statue or water fountain in the park-like settings too. This particular photo was taken from the bus tour we took. It is beautiful here when you get away from the downtown core.

Some things are the same as the states, such as movie posters! There were several on a huge movie theater we passed. I took this photo. We almost went to see Conan, the Barbarian but thought the theater would not be air conditioned. This is a country with very little air conditioning, no ice, the lights in the public restrooms are on a timer and shut off after 3 minutes. Then you have to hit a special switch for more light. The toilets are water-saver ones and everything seems to be on saving energy. It rather makes me wonder why we don't have these in our country.

 

Today is our last day in Spain. Tomorrow morning we board our Cruise Ship, The Norwegian Epic. We are more than excited about this. I promise to do more writing and putting up of pictures. 

Janie

A Stranger in a Strange Land

That's me: A Stranger in a Strange Land. Life has thrown me around quite a bit lately. It's very painful and hard to understand sometimes. When I was growing up I believed that there would be the one and only man who would ride into my life on a beautiful white stallion and we would fall deeply and passionately in love, and that my world would forever be happy and perfect. Well, there is no such thing as "happy" and no such thing as "Perfect" that lasts forever.  I look back on the last 7 months and in that time my life has totally been changed forever. Is this the first time that this has happened to me? Absolutely not. I have come to believe that the only happiness we can count on is the one that we create for ourselves and are living at this very moment, not the one before it or even the one after it, just this singular time in existence. 

The stranger is ME. The strange land is SEATTLE. With the GPS telling me where to go I do a pretty good job of "getting there". I'm a people-watcher and there are few places with the mix that Seattle has. As I write this I think that Alaska must be getting colder, and lots of rain or maybe even feeling like snow. Here it is still beautiful and has been since I arrived! No coat weather....ahhhhh.

So I decided today that I would restart my blog...which I have shamelessly pushed aside. One of the reasons is that I want to share my trip to Europe with my two daughters, with all of you. So there is no place better to do that than here on my blog, don't you think? 

I really hope you value each day as the ONLY  day you have, and that if you are granted the time here tomorrow that you not waste any of it being sad or negative or unhappy. There is too much of those things going on in the world without adding to it.