Cartagena, “at sea” and Barcelona

I am going to do both Cartagena and Barcelona together as both are in Spain and pretty well the cities are much the same.  We walked around both of these cities and just looked around locally really not knowing what there was to see but sometimes it is nice just walking around with no set place to find but still get lost. As it seems in all European cities, there are small streets that go here, there and every where and if you walk off one street, there are others that angle off from that street and before you know it, you have no idea which way you are facing and the street names are very hard to find and don’t seem to match up with the maps they give you.  Brian has been doing much of the picture taking on this holiday and he has so many pictures of me standing in the middle of a street trying to figure out where we are!  Once we arrived in Barcelona, most of the passengers on the ship were disembarking and new people are coming on.  Even though we got off the ship to look around, the docking terminal was jammed with people getting on the ship.  It is once again very hot here and after walking around for a couple of hours, we headed back to the ship so I could catch up on my blog and of course Brian heads off to the gym.  No wonder he is so fit and I just keep gaining weight!! 

We were at sea yesterday and we went to a Dance Class of “Dancing with the Stars” for the jive and out of all the people in the class they chose four people to then dance with a “pro” and then you are judged to move on to the next level of going in the Dancing with the Stars show that evening and they ended up picking me to dance with a pro and then I was chosen to move on to the show.  Not something I was expecting but felt kind of honored to be picked.  Nonetheless, the rest of the day I was scared stiff of what I had got myself into.  I had to practice with the pro twice that day; Brian came and video-taped me and then I went back to the room to practice further and still couldn’t get all the steps in my head!  Poor Brian had to listen to me agonize all day and I was so scared, I didn’t eat all day!  So last night was the big night and I had to dance on the stage with my partner in front of all the people in the show-room.  The show itself was really good but when it was my turn to go, all the steps I had tried to memorize just vanished.  My partner was really good though, kept telling me the steps as we went. There were 6 of us in the competition (a man and a woman for each dance – Cha-Cha, Samba and the jive - unfortunately I did not win but it certainly was an experience I will never forget but don’t think I would want to repeat!  I would rather be watching in the audience than participating.  I have a great appreciation of what Dancing of the Stars is all about though and how grueling it is.  It certainly was a great work-out! I will have to post the video that Brian took once we get home.  I wouldn’t be able to do it now as it takes up too much of internet time trying to upload. 

Anyway, I will post a few pictures here and hopefully at the next port – Marseille France – I will be able to upload Malaga and Cartagena/Barcelona at the same time to catch the blog up.  The days are flying by and the weather couldn’t be better although a little on the hot side.  I hear it is cold at home, so we are trying to appreciate the warmth of the Mediterranean while we can!  I have to admit we are getting a little homesick (typical for us); we are thinking that 21 days is a bit long on a cruise ship.  Now that the first 10 days are over and new people are now on the ship for the next 10 days, it may be a repeat of what we have already experienced ship-wise.  We talked to a couple this morning who had been on the ship for 18 days and they said they did find that everything is repeated included the food choices but there really is a lot to choose with the food, so next time around if menus are the same, I will just try something I didn’t eat in the last 10 days.  The food is excellent though, so we have no complaints in that regard!

This is in Cartagena and these huge trees which I think are called Bunyan trees. We finally took a shot of Brian as he has been the one always behind the camera!

This was the highlight in Cartagena – the Roman Theatre that actually has only been excavated since 1988!  It amazes me that all these ruins get built on over time and now when they dig, they find the ruins.  It was very interesting to go through the Museum associated with this and watch the video of the history going back to that time in history. 

   

Here I am trying to figure out where we are – see what I mean about the angles of the street.  It is the same in every city we have been in so far!

Brian relaxing in the pool after our walk around Cartagena.  They actually have a retractable roof that goes over the pool area if the weather turns cool or rainy. The weather has been so good that through the day it is fully retracted and then at night if it gets windy, they close them in but sometimes leave it open a small bit in the center. 

Our first stop in Barcelona was to stop for a coffee at an outside café!

These are all that we saw in Barcelona before heading back to the ship so I could catch up with my blog.  It was very hot out today with not a cloud in the sky!  Tonight we head for Marseille France.

MARSEILLE, FRANCE:  We have now arrived in Marseille but we have decided not to go into the city as the shuttle bus cost is 15 euro each and we feel 30 euro just to take a shuttle bus is too much to pay for just walking around a city.  So we went for a short walk on the pier we are docked at and came across a “Seaman’s Club” and I had my Ipad with me so tried to see if they had a free internet connection and they did!!  So I have now come back to the room to get my computer and I’m hoping to get two of these blogs posted.  So after you read this one, the Malaga blog will be below.  When I went back down, I could only get one blog entry to go, so I’m hoping Monte Carlo I will be able to send the second one plus Monte Carlo!

Our next port is Monte Carlo, so we are looking forward to that!