Santorini

As the ship had to drop anchor in the harbour, we had to take tender boats which dropped us at the bottom of the cliff at Santorini. We coud then take a donkey, a cable car or walk up 600 steps to the top. We went by cable car on the recommendation of the cruise as they said the donkeys were mistreated. At the top was the town of Fira and we found a cafe with internet and was able to skype Joel and get some news from Carlie via email. We then saw a cute art gallery and caught the bus to Oia. Oia was very pretty and we wandered the shops for an hour or so and bought some jewellery ,saw another great artist's gallery and took lots of photos - it is the picture of Greek scenes with the blue roofed white houses. We sampled some nuts covered in honey and sesame seeds the headed back on the local bus , bought a shirt for Joel and walked the 600 steps back down the cliff. We passed the donkeys going up and thought that we should have taken the donkey up instead of the cable car as it looked like fun and the donkeys seemed fine. The amazing thing was all the old men who walked beside the donkeys up the steps. how fit would they be!
Back on the ship we watched a movie in our cabin "Opa"
That night we had dinner on our own (theoretically) however our seats were so close to other couples that we ended up meeting and talking with 2 other couples beside us. After dinner the show was a comedian /juggler(different from last nght) who was hilarious.

Second Sea Day

We lost an hour during the night and woke surpised at our sleep in until we realised the clocks had been put forward.
Seminar by a greek archeologist who spoke about Santorinis devastating volcanic eruption and the archelogical finds of Actritira.
Jim went to a fitness seminar and I went to a cook off between 2 of the top chefs.
Small lunch then another seminar about Santorini in general,then a quick look at the art auction, a fashion parade,the hot glass show and a game of bocce...Jim to a talk about how celebrity is recycling and then a walk while I went for a swim.
For formal night we sat with the 3 english people again and 2 Americans from New Mexico. We went to the show which was a combination of the flute guy, the singer and a comedian.

Naples

At breakfast I tried English black pudding. Jim wouldn't even taste- do you blame him. I figured it would be good for my iron intake.
We walked around Naples fairly aimlessly, we came across' musee archeologica' and went in to see some Pompei artifacts and some huge sculptures of greek gods. Hercules was very impressive, and a room of huge old paintings. On the way back toward port we passed a riot in the streets... well a small disagreemnent between people carrying white flags and others carrying italian flags. We then found galleria monteolivetto where the exihbition was and collected my paintings. It was a very small gallery and overall we didnt like Naples at all. There were huge piles of rubbish left in the streets ...not pleasant. Feet are sore after these walking days so I am looking forward to a sea day tomorrow.
At dinner we sat with an american family with 2 teenage kids and 3 british people travelling together. We saw Capri go by in the window as we left port to head towards the greek islands.
During the night I woke as we travelled through the gap at the bottom of Italy with the lights of Sicily and the outline of the island visible. It has been super calm so far and no need for seasick tablets.

Rome

We woke to the ship entering the port of Civitavecchia, went and had breaky and got the train to the Vatican. Jim had been before but I hadn't and we saw the Sistine chapel, the map room and the tapestry room etc. Then we caught the bus to Via Nationale and tried 2 Maccas but unfortunaly they didnt have wifi. Then we did some shopping at a shop we found last time 'tenezis'. Then headed to the trevi fountain just to have another look. Unfortunately on heading home we caught the right bus but going in the wrong direction. We realised fairly soon though and managed to get off cross the road and catch it in the proper direction towards the train station where we caught the train back to the ship, still in plenty of time.Just before boarding we found a place with wifi and managed to send a quick not home.
Dinner with an english couple. I tried snails but was not a huge fan - they were ok.
We then went to watch a very talented flutest in the evening show

First Sea Day

We went to the buffet for breakfast. People could get seriously fat on these cruises !! We went to a galley tour where we saw where the food was prepared for feeding 2800 people . We went to an italian lesson and a glass blowing demonstation. We had lunch at the aqua cafe , cooked salmon and salad then went to the buffet for a dessert of kiwi sorbet and banana pudding. In the afternoon we separated, I went to an art auction and Jim went to a fitness talk which he said was very controversial . Then back to our room and watched "The Kings Speech".
At 6.45pm we passed through 2 islands so we went to the front of the boat to watch. The evening dinner was our first formal one and we were a little underdressed .Many men had proper tuxedos and womans evening dresses. We sat with 4 other couples, including the 2 woman from last night. It was interesting to meet everyone though we did have to steer around a heated discussion about climate change at one point.
I had frogs legs ,fish soup,rack of lamb and creme brulee. Jim had salmon entree,cold tangarine soup, chicken saltinbacco and creme brulee. It is like fine dining every night
We went to the solstice show and it was a type of circ du solei performance . The gymnasts were excellent, considering the show is on board a ship.

Cruise begins

Today we took public transport to 3 Gaudi buildings,casa batli, casa ??? and sagrida familia.Then back to b and b to pack up and get ready to board our cruise. When we got to the port there was music playing and a gruop of people doing latin dancing so we stopped to watch .We then boarded our ship the Celebrity Solstice and settled into our room. Awesome!!! For dinner we went to the main dining restaurant and it was a 4 course dinner that changes each night.We sat with a couple of widows from edinborough that we enjoyed talking to. The woman wondered what we were going to do for our sea day if we were not interesetd in getting a tan...funny!

Barcelona

Today was a walking day. We walked to Le Ramblas stopping at 'st antoni' market where we bought a scarf as a gift.The food part of the market had wonderful fresh food and interesting foods. We bought a fig and a huge loquat. We then walked on to Le Ramblas and saw portrait artists that were very good. We then headed over to the gothis quarter and saw a lovle cathedral and walked in just in time for a wedding.Our feet were quite sick of walking by then so we sat and watched a the wedding for a while . The item was a choir boy singing' ave maria'.... very atmospheric. We headed down toward the port and past the columbus statue and were ready to start making our way back.
On our way back we had lunch at the st antoni market.It was all in Spanish however so we knew' bacolla' was the word for cod so Jim ordered a meal with that word in it.I was going to order a meal with verde in which I knew was vegetables but saw the lady next door with a nice meat dish in a tomato sauce and pointed to that as my order.When it came out Jims dish was raw cod and fresh tomato chopped up like a salsa salad and my dish was tripe and brains in a tomato sauce.. Very Mr Beanish .I liked my dish very much but Jim wouldn't share it with me at all. He actually really like his even though it tasted very fishy.
After a rest in the afternoon we headed out to the Arena and Magic fountain for the evening musical fountain show.