Jul 28, 2018 - Farewell Barcelona, Hello Paris

We got up early and finished packing as well as cleaning up our little BNB. Virginia the lady who had greeted us had phoned a taxi for us (at least we think she did) anyways we waited and waited, then we moved the luggage to the corner and waited some more, finally Phil and I went up to the main road to find a taxi, I even checked Uber and there was nothing, only buses. We went back, Scott and Tracey were talking to a man who turned out to be a cab driver and he told us there was a 3 day strike! Great! Fortunately the gentleman offered to...

Jul 27, 2018 - Parc Guell

Today we went to yet another little cafe (there are a lot of them) and had brekkie. We hopped in a cab and went to Parc Guell for our tour. As I said previously the Parc is high up in the city and has great views. Our tour guide Anna was very good, she loved to talk and was very knowledgeable about the history of the Parc. The Parc was originally designed for the Bourgeois, they wanted to live outside the old Gothic Quarter of the city, the design was originally for 60 houses, but it ended up only having 3 houses, a reception house and a...

Jul 26, 2018 - Basilica De La Sagrada Familia

After a quiet morning and a nice breakfast at a little cafe we headed on the Metro to the Sagrada Familia for our tour - when Tracey and I were there approximately 12 years ago you lined up, paid for your entry and wondered around, nowadays a limited number of people are allowed in during the day and at set times. Anyway, the Basilica is magnificent! they work on finishing the church by 2026 - the 100 anniversary of Antoni Gaudi's death, he spent 43 years working on the design, interesting fact he was not the original architect for the...

Jul 25, 2018 - Montserrat and Oller Del Mas Winery

We were up early today as we are off to Montserrat to see the Black Madonna. We had breakfast at a lovely cafe close to the tour departure point. There were a lot of people waiting for the tour. There area is obviously a departure point for a lot of tours. The Pink Umbrella arrived and we were directed to our tour guide - the lovely Jordi - he was very welcoming and understood the Aussie sense of humour straight away - all up there were 10 people in our tour group. We all climbed aboard the bus - there were 3 tour groups with the same...

Jul 24, 2018 - Barcelona Hop on Hop off Bus tours

Today we had breakfast at a small cafe (it was so good..) then it was off to complete the second part of the hop on - hop off bus tour, today we saw the Gothic Quarter, the other side of the port and beaches, ( at the port we saws a very large yacht with its own helicopter), the new part of Barcelona, La Sagrada Familiar, boy has that changed from when I was here 12 years ago, we are going to go on a guided tour of the Familiar on Thursday. Following this, the tour continued up to Parc Guell, where we got off for a closer look at the Park...

Jul 23, 2018 - Barcelona - we have arrived

We arrived at Barcelona at 7:00 am, after going through immigration and customs we found a little cafe to have a snack and coffee and killing some time before heading to our accommodation. Whilst enjoying the wait I checked the email and found we could get into our accommodation early - how great was that. So we were looking for the Taxi rank when we nice young gentleman asked us what we were looking for, we explained what we wanted and he had a transit van and gave us a good quote to get to the Air BNB. The drive into Barcelona was good...

Jul 22, 2018 - Up date for Sunday 15th

Dear all, Well today we missed two family birthdays. Our son Ashley and granddaughter Amelia celebrated their birthdays. We went out to a special dinner on the ship just so we didn't miss out as well. We went to the markets at Teguise today. I have never seen so many stalls, all covered in white tents because of the heat. When we entered there didn't seem to be too many there but as we walked in the whole area just opened up. We were there early and as the morning moved on the number of the stalls increased. They were selling jewellery,...

Jul 22, 2018 - Update for Saturday 14th July

Dear all, It is Sunday morning here in London. Well we are on the move again. We have completed our cruise and spent 24 hours with Sue and Philip and now we are waiting at Heathrow airport for journey flight to Bucharest where we arrive tonight at 17.45. I just wanted to complete our cruise and map. We were supposed to do a submarine trip in Las Palmas but the weather at the dive site was too rough so just did a Hop on Hop off bus ride. All these islands are the same Scenary. They were all volcanoes so are high mountains, a few valleys and...

Jul 17, 2018 - Up date for Friday 13th

Dear all, Well moving on. Friday saw us in Tenerife visiting two lovely gardens. Some plants and flowers are very similar to ours but thought the bromeliads are really large and some of the flowers on them quite large. Have included one picture. It is a little windy and cooler on the ship. We are having a lovely time getting lots of rest ready for the trips ahead. Kind regards Dianne and Paul

Jul 14, 2018 - La Coruna

Dear all, Well we are on the cruise to the Canary Islands. Wifi on the ship is expensive so we are at McDonalds using their wifi so will try to up date a couple of blogs to set the map up. La Conuna is in Spain. We have previously visited there in 2011 when we were on a cruise when we came to England for our niece's wedding. Wil keep them brief. Kind regards, Dianne and Paul

Jun 30, 2018 - Day 4: June 21, 2018

Thursday morning began with an early wake-up catch the train to Paris! The parting from Barcelona was bittersweet since we all enjoyed our time there so much, and at the same time, the anticipation of singing at Notre Dame was building! I thoroughly enjoyed the 6.5 hour train ride from Barcelona to Paris. The scenery was so picturesque, there was room to spread out and sleep, and there was a food car to grab coffee and snacks. :) Our tour guide for the day, Sam Kunkle, met us at the train station and led us to the coach bus that would drive...

Jun 28, 2018 - Day 3: June 20, 2018

Day 3 in Barcelona, Spain began with an hour long bus ride toward the Catalan Pre-Coastal Mountain Range and the Parc Natural de la Muntanya de Montserrat. The word ‘Montserrat’ means “serrated mountains.” The location is best known in the Catholic faith for the Benedictine Abbey, Santa Maria de Montserrat. Once we arrived, we took a little time to take in the scenery and walk the grounds near the Montserrat Monastery. The views of the cliffs were absolutely breathtaking and the rock formations are striking! We soon made our way toward The...