Lucca and Pisa

I’m starting with a picture; guess where we are?

You guessed it – Leaning Tower of Pisa!!

We arrived in Livorno this morning and we had booked a ship excursion taking us to Lucca and Pisa.  We both really wanted to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and this was a half day excursion, so felt it was worth taking.  Truly it was breathtaking. Here are more pictures of this area:

These are the buildings you see when you walk into the area; the round building is the “Baptismal” where babies/people are baptized and at the very top of the building is John, The Baptist; the building behind  that is the Cathedral and behind that is the leaning tower of Pisa. 

This is inside the Baptismal building with the statute of John the Baptist.

 

When taking pictures, it was hard to show the “lean” so I took a close up of the bottom as you can see the “lean” better there. 

We also visited the city of Lucca which is a city surrounded by a wall dating back to the early 16th century.  They started constructing the wall in the mid 1500’s and finished it in 1654.  This village is renown for keeping it as a Medieval Village to this day.  They are quite strict who can live there, if you are not born there, you cannot live in Lucca.  They used to keep all people out that were not from the village but in recent years have opened it up to tourists – obviously for financial reasons (in our opinion).  Nevertheless, it is a very quaint village and the tour was very interesting.

The entrance to Lucca

The wall that completely surrounds Lucca. There is no vegetation close to the wall as it was all removed when originally built to keep the enemy out and they have kept it that way to this day. 

The cathedral within Lucca. 

Other points of interest in Lucca.

So tomorrow is the “big day” when we arrive in Civitavecchia which is the port closest to Rome.  We are doing Rome “on our own” with the information I researched before we left for the trip.  We are taking the train from Civitavecchia to Rome which is about an hour away.  I’m praying that we do not get lost and that we find our way back to Civitavecchia on the train.  Our plan is to see what we can of Rome in a few hours.  I know there is a lot to see, so hopefully we can put a small dent in to some interesting places!

Monte Carlo, Monaco

We are in Monte Carlo right now and sitting a cute little bar called Stars N Bars and they have free Wi-Fi.  So I just published Cartagena which will be below this post, so make sure you go down and read that one as well.  Finally found a fast internet connection while Brian is having a beer and I am having a Café Macchiato!

We arrived in Monaco this morning and looked out our window and what a sight!  The home to the rich and famous!

We got off the  ship and just started to walk but were once again really unsure of where to go.  The street you see behind me here is part of the Grand Prix race track.  This replica was a man (I can’t remember his name) but he won the Grand Prix four or five times in the early 50’s to 60’s.  His car was a Mercedes Benz. 

After we walked past this, a lady on the street (who lives in Monte Carlo) asked us if we would like help on what to see.  She directed us to the older part of Monte Carlo up the mountain to see The Palace, Cathedral and Oceanographic Museum which is all considered the older part of Monte Carlo.  She said we could go the opposite way to the Casino but other than seeing the outside of it and the fancy cars, they were doing a lot of renovations in that area and really was not the best thing to go and see.  She was very helpful and directed us to the path that went up the mountain

Quite a work-out I must say!

 

A statue of Prince Ranier along the way.

The Palace where the Royal Family live – Prince Ranier died in 2005 and Prince Albert is the current reigning prince.  We went through the museum attached to the Palace and were able to see parts of the palace that are now on display to the public.  Very very interesting place but no photos were allowed.  I love the story of Grace Kelly and Prince Ranier and unfortunately she died fairly young in a car crash coming down the mountain in 1982.

A picture of the cathedral.

We also went through the Oceanographic Museum as well.

This is the back of the Oceanographic Museum. 

On  the way back down to the ship, we found this little alcove where people were swimming. 

We climbed down the stairs and Brian was finally able to put his feet in the warm Mediterranean Sea! 

This is looking up the rock from the little beach alcove.  Monte Carlo is completely built on the side of mountains.  So tomorrow we head for Livorno, Italy and we are actually going to be seeing the Leaning Tower of Pisa tomorrow on a ship excursion. 

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!

Malaga, Spain–Sept 7, 2014

I had pre-booked a City Bike Tour for Malaga and all we had to do was find our way to the meeting point.  The dock here is huge and it is a 2 mile walk to the entrance, so fortunately they had shuttle buses that drove us to the City Centre.  We were to meet at a place called Plaza de la Marina in front of the Tourist Office and we started to get really nervous as the bus drove right past the Tourist Office but thankfully he had to drive by it in order to turn around and park in a bus parking area which was just across from the Tourist Office.  Charlotte, our tour guide was waiting for us and she took us to the bike store which was just around the corner to get our bikes.  She was very informative and it was a nice ride around the city and she showed  us the points of interest in this area. 

One of the most interesting points was that Antonia Banderas (Hollywood actor) is from Malaga, Spain.  She showed us the church he attended when a youngster and how he returns quite often and apparently he is moving back to Malaga to live next year.  He has bought the top part of a building in the city center which is now being renovated and getting ready for him to move in. 

Malaga is also the birth place of Pablo Picasso, pictures to follow including his birth certificate!

This is our bike group of 9 people.  This was an open square and where the house is that Picasso was born.

Picasso was born and lived as a young boy somewhere on the second floor from the top in the middle. 

This is Picasso as a man but apparently  he only lived in Malaga until the age of 10 or 12 before his family moved out of the region. His father was artist as well!

Way back in the day (as our guide would often say), the Muslins/Arabic people occupied this area but at some point in history, the Christians took over and pushed the Muslins out.  They took over all the Mosques and turned them into Christian churches (mainly Catholic – I think) but some areas of the church you still see parts that show they were originally Muslin. This was the original door as it was in the Muslin era as you see by the Mosiac tile around the door. 

As you see though, the insides of the church are Christian.  It was absolutely beautiful inside this church but from the outside you would have never known it looked like this on the inside.

This is another Church that took over 200 years to build and in fact it is still not finished. It has a Tower on the right but the left is still not built. So the Malaga people are quite proud to have a church that is still not finished and dates back centuries! This is the church where Picasso was christened. His birth certificate is below:

Picasso’s birth certificate – It is so big as he has many many middle names!

This is the church where Antonio Banderas was christened and attended in his younger years.  He returns once a year at least and is very keen on going back to the church of his youth.  Antonio donates a lot of money to charitable organizations in Malaga especially for the enhancement of children’s lives. 

We thought of Roy when we saw this.  This is scaffolding over a building that is being renovated and is covered with this huge poster of a local beer!

At the end of our bike tour we rode along the beach area promenade.  It was quite crowded with people as it was yet another hot day – high 20’s but it felt like 30 to me!

The bike tour was approximately 4 hours and we were happy to get back to the ship as we were very hot!!  Tomorrow we head for Cartagena, Spain!

Gibraltar, British Territory

Well, I must say this was the best day so far.  We did a ship excursion called “Stroll on the Rock” and we had a great guide!  He was very passionate about Gibraltar and he really knew his history. We didn’t realize that Gibraltar has been a military land-hold since 711.  It was in about 1785 that they started to build tunnels in the rock which continued until WWII and there are 34 miles of tunnels in the rock!!  Isn’t that just so unbelievable. Inside the tunnel was basically a small town where they lived, had a hospital and they were all well protected.  It was amazing that they built these tunnels with a chisel, chipping away at the rock until later years when they had gun-powder to blast their way through the rock but then they had to deal with gun powder dust that would take 3 days to settle so one soldier (the name escapes me) came up with the idea of blasting a hole in the rock to the outside which then released the dust quicker as 3 days was too long for them to wait.  Time was of the essence.  Of course, another big attraction is the Barbary monkeys that roam free on the Rock.  The city of Gibraltar do not want the monkeys to come down the rock and get into town so they ask humans not to feed them (500 pound fine if you do feed them).  The monkeys are provided food by the government of Gibraltar which consists of fruits and vegetables.  Monkeys do not eat meat apparently.  I could go on and on about Gibraltar but needless to say it was heaped in history and just a great place to visit.  Here are some pictures and later on I am going to do a video on just Gibraltar.  Here are a few pictures: 

On the cable car going up the side of the rock. 

Rock of Gibraltar!!

The rock on the other side looking toward Africa

A view of our ship from the top of the rock and city of Gibraltar with population of about 30,000 people.  Across the Bay is Spain. 

These are pictures of St. Michael’s Cave which was huge!  In WWII this cave was used as a hospital base and an area where troops would hide.  They initially thought that Hitler was going to strike in Gibraltar and the allied troops waited here but then Hitler changed his mind as he couldn’t hide the fact that he might strike; so this is one place Hitler never attacked  (I hope I have this story straight.  There was so much history given, it is hard to remember it all!)

A picture of the monkeys.  The one on the right they had a little baby which the guided estimated to be a couple of months old.  There are apparently over 200 Barbary apes on the rock.

These are some pictures of the tunnels and how they were built – see the picture above with the men using chisels to chip away the rock.  Also one of the generals said they needed a gun or cannon that pointed down so if they were attacked from the bottom of the rock, they needed a cannon that would shoot down and the picture of the cannon pointing down is one that was designed just for that purpose. 

Gibraltar was a totally amazing place to see.  It was another absolutely beautiful day, temperature around 25 degrees.  So now I am sitting on the Lido pool deck updating my blog with a Pina Colada in hand, Brian with a beer and swimming in the pool.  Life couldn’t get much better than this – we are very fortunate!