Author Archives: bettesbatson

Today was basically about Gaudi, the famous Spanish architect who started the fabulous church called Sagrada Familia. We had 2 local guides today which allowed our group of 31 to be split into small groups while touring. We all used the same bus, but when we got to a site we were in our small group. The Sagrada Familia was started 137 years ago and is a Catholic Church. It has been funded by donations, with no money coming from any government entity. It is still a work in progress with several cranes and lots of workmen. We had been here 15 years ago and at that time they were just beginning to work on some of the balconies and the floors were not installed yet.

The building is fanciful, extraordinary, unique and amazing. It is very organic. In 7 years it will be the 100th anniversary of the death of Gaudi and they are trying to complete the church by then. He was a young man when he died accidentally, being run over by a tram. Since his death and after a fire destroyed most of his plans other architects and craftsmen have taken on the design and completion of the building.

We also went up to Montjuic to get an overview of the city and to see some of the Olympic venues.

Our hotel gave us free tickets to tour Palau Guell, a private home designed by Gaudi. It was magnificent. The decorations of wood, wrought iron, tile work, stonework and fantasy were amazing.

The famous bow window from outside

Music balcony overlooking large reception area

Some of the 18 chimneys on the rooftop – we are wearing headphones, have not grown stuff on our heads!

We missed going into the main Cathedral because there was a funeral there. Now we have a reason to return.

Tapas for dinner tonight, a short walk and packing up. Our bags are being collected tonight so when we fly to Malaga tomorrow morning we can get right on our bus and start touring. Our luggage will be transported overnight by bus to our next hotel.

Early morning- we leave at 7:15 so early to bed. Good night.

Today was our last day to sleep late on this trip. This evening we join the Tauck Week in Spain trip and we know from experience that the days will start early.

We walked from our hotel to the Picasso Museum which is just outside the main Gothic area of Barcelona. The museum is in several old buildings that have been beautifully joined together. There was a special exhibition besides the main one. The special one was a photographic one with photos of Picasso and his friends from different times and showed his studio and workshops. The main exhibit followed his career from his early works onward. It was interesting to see his style change.

We then wandered around seeing some beautiful plazas and the lovely buildings in the Gothic quarter.

September 11th is Cataluna day (Barcelona is in Cataluna) and there were lots of people out in the streets and many stores and shops were closed. There was also a demonstration, because the Catalans wanted to separate from Spain and at the last election it was voted down.

Flags from the people demonstrating

We came back to the hotel to rest and then met our touring group. Most of the people on the tour are seniors like us.

Early to bed because we start at 8:20 in the morning.

We woke up on Tuesday morning at 6:15 and found 4 messages from our guide Stephen. He wanted to know if we still wanted to do the tour since it was predicted to be a bad weather day. We decided to go for it.

After breakfast we walked to our meeting point. Our group was only 4 people and the guide. The other couple was from Taiwan, Michael and Pedge. On the ride to Montserrat which took about 45 minutes, Stephen told us historical information about Barcelona and Montserrat.

Fortunately the rain had stopped. We rode a cable car up to the main area where the monastery and church are located, but then rode a finicular up higher on the mountain. We did a hike to see the various features of the spires for which Montserrat is named.

We went to the church which was huge and extremely ornate. We got to hear the famous boy’s choir sing and when we came out it was pouring. Great timing, we got in all the outside activities before the rains came.

We then went to a farm restaurant for lunch. Bette was brave and had boar stew.

Then back to Barcelona and a rainy walk back to the hotel. Tapas for dinner.

On Monday morning we were able to sleep in a little. The prior night the party in typical Spanish style was just getting rolling when we left at 11:15. We were barely able to get to bed on the same day we woke up – a Bob rule. We had a transfer to the train station and we were off to Barcelona.

Senior citizens don’t do good selfies

We checked into our hotel right on La Rambla. Once we got our luggage into our room we were out walking. Our objective was to find the location of where we were to meet our tour in the morning. It took some effort, but we found this tiny obscure street. On the way we saw some of Barcelona’s beautiful fountains, streets and the outside of 2 of the Gaudi buildings. We also passed every big name in fashion stores along the way.

Then it was dinner time and we went to a small restaurant on La Rambla and had several tapas which were very good. Bob ordered a beer, but got a “keg”.

Then we were off to bed, because we had to be up early. Unfortunately our room faced La Rambla and there was loud noise and music until late. Then there was a ferocious rain storm. Bad weather predicted for Tuesday and it had already started in the middle of the night.

Fingers crossed for the rain to not be too bad on Tuesday.

We started today walking around Alcala de Henares. We toured Cervantes’ birth home and then we think we saw the building where Columbus was sent off to discover America.

Statue of Cervantes in Plaza de Cervantes

We came back to the hotel to rest for a while.

The entrance to our hotel

We then went to the Monasterio de Bernardo’s for the ceremony. The church was beautiful. The Bishop of the Madrid area did the ceremony. The sister’s choir was wonderful to hear. There were eleven women taking their final vows and one man. There were at least 400 in attendance. The whole event was very moving. You could see the emotion in the faces of the parents as well as the young women. We were very honored to attend. After the ceremony we all went back to the monastery where the sisters stay when they are in this area. There was dinner for well over 300 people. We snagged a bottle of champagne and drank it from our Burger King cups!

The Bishop

Taking the vows

The new Sister Miriam

The Loveland family

Just the usual folks

Sister Miriam, Bob and Sister Bailey

Champagne!

We enjoyed this experience.

Now we are off to Barcelona.

Fort Myers to JFK to Madrid and finally Alcala de Henares. We were fortunately able to get directly into our room after we arrived here. The Paradore we are staying at is wonderful. Parts of it are from an old 17th century monastery school. It has several restaurants, a spa, pool, fitness center and is obviously the place to hold your wedding reception, 2 today.

After freshening up, Sr. Miriam, her mother, Bridget, her real sister, Sarah and her religious sister, Maria picked us up in Alcala and took us to Loeches, the local site of the order. We toured the monastery where the sisters are staying, attended a noon prayer service and had lunch. We were able to visit with Mimi and her family for most of the afternoon. They are all excited about her taking her final vows tomorrow. We came back late, took a long walk, had a light dinner and we are trying to stay up a little longer so we are not awake at 4 AM.

Tomorrow we will do some sightseeing, this is the home of Cervantes and one of the buildings is where Queen Isabella gave Christopher Columbus the thumbs up to find a route to the new lands.

Bob and Sr. Miriam

In front of the church where the ceremony will be held tomorrow.

In front of another church – there seems to be one on every corner.

On Calle Mayor – the pedestrian street in the heart of Alcala

Hello friends,

I am unable to post from the ship as the internet is not strong enough. I can do words, but no photos. So I will try to keep telling our story, but without pictures (which I think are the best part) 😉

More later now that I know the challenges I have to get around.

Bette

Today, Bob, Mike and Bette walked around Venice, wandering through small streets and squares. We ended up at the Santa Maria de la Salute Church only to find it did not open until 3. We then took the vaporetto all the way down the Grand Canal. We did some shopping for Mike since he and Cheri still had no luggage. After lunch on the ship, Bette and Cheri went shopping for clothes and cosmetics for her. Then the luggage was delivered!

We had our life boat drill and we sailed out of Venice. Dinner in Toscana. A win at trivia.

The day ended well.

We had three days in Venice. On the first one, because of all the flight delays we just walked around and then had dinner in a small restaurant in a square.

Our ship, Oceania Riviera, with Venice in the background as we were landing.

In the Piazza de San Marco

The first thing we did on the second day was tour the Doges Palace before transferring to our ship by water taxi. We had to dodge lots of gondolas on the way. After lunch we took the people mover to get into Venice and walked until we found the Jewish quarter. We took a tour of the 3 synagogues. It was very interesting. The three different ones were French, German and Ashkenazi.

From the Bridge of Sighs

Our beautiful suite on the ship

After a wonderful wedding for our son, Michael, and his beautiful bride, Dylan, last weekend we are finally off on our next adventure. Well, we thought we were off, but a series of events have bogged us down.

Our flight from Boston to Paris and then connecting on to Venice was due to leave at 7:06 PM. We actually left at 7:30 but did not actually fly until 8. This was somewhat problematic since our connection in Paris was only 70 minutes. When we landed in Paris, we thought we would be fine until our gate was not ready and then when it was ready we were in a remote area that took 15 minutes by bus to get us to the terminal. We did the run through the terminal, going through passport control and security and getting to our gate about 3 minutes too late to make the flight.

We are now waiting for our rebooked flight hoping that our bags have also been rebooked.

Our friends, Cheri and Mike Madsen, who we were meeting in Paris, had plane problems and ended getting rerouted directly to Venice. Unfortunately no one rerouted their bags. They have been told that the bags will get here tomorrow and be sent directly to the ship.

Upside, great shopping in Paris airport 😉

We hope this is the only “oops” we encounter.