Valencia, Spain

Valencia, Spain was our favorite port by far. I think it is because we had an awesome tour guide on our tour of the city.

Derek's co-worker, Cindy Wheeler booked this private tour for 25 people and invited us along. Our tour guide, Suzie, was half Dutch, half Spanish - that is probably why she was so good :)

We took a bus to the City of Arts and Sciences which is an architectural phenomenon. The majority of the building constructed were made of concrete and then covered in white ceramic. One of the structures was made to look like the human eye - maybe you can tell from the pictures. In almost all of the buildings, there is no man-made light because there are so many windows in the buildings. We didn't take a tour of the whole facility, mostly just the outside. At the top of one of the buildings, there was a display of sundials and different time keepers for seasons, months, years, days, hours, etc. It was so interesting to think back to when this method of time keeping was developed.

Derek winking - this is the building that looks like an eye. The supports in the window are supposed to resemble eyelashes.

 From the City of Arts and Sciences, we headed to the old part of downtown. Our first stop was a Horchateria where we enjoyed Horchata (Spanish horchata is different than Mexican horchata) and a sweet bun. I added a cappuccino to my order too :)

Valencia is the only city in Spain that still allows bull fighting. It happens in this arena only 4 times per year. We missed in by just a few days - the next one was scheduled for July 27.

These were some amazing ornate marble sculptures.

Derek turning a really big door knob.

When royalty living here, this sculpture would face inward when they were home, in a sense, guarding them, and when they were out, she would face out. When we walked in, she did not turn.

This was an old pharmacy turned into a boutique selling only Valencia made items. Here we tasted some Valencia made wine made from Valencia oranges.

 After eating, we walked around the downtown area for a bit and ended up in one of the biggest markets in Spain. There was a section for meats and cheeses, for fruits and vegetables and a section for seafood. We found some interesting offerings in each section. In the meats and cheeses area there were whole, skinned, rabbits that included eyes along with scalded pigs and ham hocks (prosciutto types I think); in the seafood area there was a dried shark and little pools of eels that the sellers would swipe their hands in to make them squirm when tourists were lingering near them. A little unnverving... Our tour guide had set up a special area there for us to have some champagne with some cheese, sausage, and prosciutto from one of the vendors.

 We stopped at another café to have little open faced sandwiches again with meats and cheeses on top along with sangria. There were all types. I had one with cream cheese, kiwi and another fruit and one with cheese and ham. Our friends had ordered Spanish paella to share which was also very good.

 After seeing the market, we headed to walk to some cathedrals and some old plazas in the area. At one of the cathedrals, there was a bronze replica of the cathedral right in front that was built for blind people to feel the building and how it was built. There was a braille explanation of the building so it would be described as they felt the structure.

One castle that we walked by was right along a square that dated back to 138 BC. There is a picture of a doorway and if you look to the right of the doorway, there is a stone with scars on it - these scars were made from the sharpening of axes that were used for beheadings in the square. 

 Our last stop of the day was at Café de las Horas where we had more tapas and more sangria. We enjoyed "sausages from hell" (the name in Spanish was much cooler sounding but I forget it), braised potatoes with a spicy sauce, fried cheeses with a raspberry sauce, shrimp in garlic butter, and baguettes. The sangria at all these places was just fantastic! We learned how to give a traditional Spanish toast - Up, Down, Center, In the throat (I forget the Spanish words again) -with a popular dessert liquor. We loaded back on to the bus and headed back to the boat. No wonder it was my favorite tour with all the food and sangria :)

Palma de Mallorca, Spain

This port was the only port where we booked an excursion through the cruise line. It was a 3.5 hour kayaking adventure. It was fun but definitely not worth the money we paid. Oh well, lesson learned :)

 Once again, Kelli and Nash joined us for the day. Off the boat, we took a bus where we met our kayak guides who had prepared the kayaks for our use. We set off and had a beautiful view of the island from our kayaks. We went past many beautiful homes that are built right into the cliffs. Most had been renovated as we learned new constructed houses must be 100 meters back from the water. We also saw some very interesting rock formations right along the water.

 After kayaking maybe an hour, we stopped at a secluded rocky beach to swim for a while. The water was shallow for quite a ways out but maneuvering was difficult as the bottom of the ocean in that area was so rocky. After swimming for a little we got back into the kayaks and headed to our final destination where the bus was waiting for us. We ended up in a little cove with a sandy beach and a little restaurant. This was a really pretty place for us to take pictures.

The guys experimenting with the underwater camera.

This picture WAS posted intentionally.... Look closer.... closer... under the rocks. Do you see it?

 On the way back, we had the option of getting dropped off by the main marina on the island. We walked around the marina and dreamed of one day owning a yacht (yeah, right). There were some pretty awesome boats and a lot of them were for sale. Needless to say, we didn't purchase one :) At the marina, we stopped in a waterfront café and had another excellent cappuccino and the best nachos ever along with some amazing pizza. Finally, we took a cab back and got back on the boat and relaxed until dinner time.

Yet another AMAZING cappucino.

More explicit signage in Europe. Doesn't seem to work well there. We were amazed at how many people smoke in Europe in comparison to the US.

Alghero, Italy

Alghero, Italy is on the island of Sardinia which is where Paul spent some time preaching in Bible times. I was most excited for this port out of all of the ports. Once off the boat, we walked around the old village towns and saw some amazing cathedrals. We were joined by Kelli and Nash again and Cindy Wheeler (who Derek worked with in the LA area) and her husband, Ben, and daughter, Samantha. It was Saturday so every cathedral we walked by or into was hosting or preparing for a wedding. These churchs that are such works of art are very common day in Europe. The whole trip we were constantly reminded of how young America really is!

At the entrance to the old town part of Alghero

 

Standing on one of the walls of the city built many years ago. You can see our boat in the background.

Practicing our ninja skills (or maybe our Jedi skills...)

Walking around the fortress walls.

Look at how big these doors are!! 

 While walking around the village, we stopped for gelato and cappuccino which was really yummy. After a couple hours of taking in the sights, we headed to the beach via taxi. The beaches were white sand and just beautiful. They were also packed with men in Speedos and a few topless sun bathers. We all shielded our eyes of course :) 

At the beach with the boat in the background.

The view of Alghero from the boat.

Around lunch time, we headed back to the port to get some lunch and wait for the boat (this was our shortest port day and we had to be all aboard at 2:30).  A cab driver made a recommendation for lunch at a sandwich place right across the street from where the line for the tender boats was located.

The sandwiches were made on focaccia bread and were layered with Sardinian sausages and cheeses. Although it was just a sandwich, this was one of my favorite meals on the trip! We watched the line for the boat in the shade along with our beers and when the line was shorter, we headed over and loaded back onto the cruise ship. Once on board, Derek and I had a couples massage in the spa on the ship. It was just wonderful!

This is actually a view of Tunis, Africa at sunrise. Tunis is normally a port on this cruise but State Farm requires one day at sea for the cruises so they can have a business meeting on board. I was disappointed to not get to set foot on Africa.

Santa Margharita, Italy

The second port on our cruise was Santa Marghartia, Italy (close to Portofino). Here we met up with Derek's cousin, Luke Wagner in a town called Rio Maggiere which is part of Cinque Terre (pronounced chin-qua tear ay and means 5 lands). The five villages are old fishing villages that are about 4-5 miles apart but are connected by steep staircases and narrow pathways that are as old as the villages (dating back to the 1100s). Mike and Robin Bratton and their son Joey and daughter-in-law Amanda joined us for this day. Rio Maggiere was the furthest village and was 1.5 hours by train. Once we got there, we found that the trail connecting is to the next village was closed due to rock slide. We walked around the town and ate some Italian cheese and sausage and had some pesto pizza that the area is famous for. We then took the train to another village called Montague and proceeded on our hike from Monterosso to Vernazza. The stairs were very steep and very long. About 370 on the way up and then again on the way down. It was quite a hike but the trail is all along the coastline (which is a top a cliff) so the higher you went, the better the views.

Rio Maggiere

A little over half way up.... Keep on climbing!

Joey and Amanda Bratton, me and Robin Bratton

More stairs to climb... Luke Wagner, Derek and Mike Bratton.

I think this was looking back on the town of Monterosso

Looking down on the village Vernazza

Is anybody home?

 When we were almost to Vernazza, there was an accordion player nestled in the hill serenading us. If anyone is looking for a money-making business venture, selling water along those paths would be quite profitable! It was HOT! Once in Vernazza, we stopped at a pub type restaurant where Luke ordered a couple different appetizer type dishes and they were similar to bruschetta, caprese, and baguettes topped with meats and cheeses. The food was delicious and so were the mojitos and margaritas we ordered.

 After we finished eating, we briefly looked around the village and then caught the train. Trains in Italy are rarely on time, if they come at all. At the train station, we realized that the only train back to where our boat was that was non-stop didn't arrive until 4:17 which was a problem as the trip was 1.5 hours and we had to be all aboard at 4:30. We boarded a train that we would take as far as it would go and then hop another train to get the rest of the way to Santa Margharita. Before we came to the transfer station, we were asked for our train tickets by a ticket collector that spoke no English. We were then told that we neglected to get our tickets validated at the train station (which no one informed us we needed to do) so each person had to pay 50 Euros a piece. Our tickets were only about 5 Euros each way so we said that we would get off at the next stop to validate our ticket. Of course, the train guy spoke no English so then continued to yell at us to give him our tickets and pay the money. He had a little card that explained lack of validation "could" result in a fine but no monetary amount was listed. The next stop came and went and Derek and Robin were still involved in a heated discussion with the guy. Meanwhile, there was a young couple on their honeymoon that were seated next to us from Switzerland that were also asked to pay. Once they heard that we were not paying, the young man offered to pay the fine for us all. It was so sweet of him - young people were definitely the stars of this story.
The next station was the transfer station so I was hoping we could make it there and get off an be done with it. The train guy finally said we could pay 5 Euro rather than 50 Euro. At this point, it started to feel a little bit like extortion so Derek and Robin refused to pay at all. This really made the man upset and he demanded our documentation (passports) which we then refused to give up also. The man at this point started yelling that he was going to call the polizia if we didn't pay. I started to get very nervous as our time was already close to making it on the ship. We really couldn't afford to be detained by he police. Finally, the train guy headed up the steps to the second floor and we figured we would get off the train and avoid the whole situation. We got off at the transfer station and headed to the bulletin board with the train map and times to see when our train would be arriving.
When we got there we turned around to find that the train guy had followed us off the train and had recruited another train worker to help yell at us. Of course, he also spoke no English so we are trying to say that we purchased the tickets today and were on our way to validate them. The issue with the validation is that the train tickets are valid for a certain amount of uses within a two month period so if the tickets are not validated, you could use them more than the allotted times. Derek then said he would stay with the train people while we headed up to the platform, validated our tickets and waited for the trains.
On the train platform, I found a young (maybe 19-20) Italian kid in a blue shirt that spoke broken English. I asked him to talk to the train workers for us and translate what we were saying. The train workers followed us upstairs and meanwhile, had recruited another train worker - this one was a women. We then watched a VERY heated discussion take place between our young translator and the train workers. This discussion drew the attention of all the people on the platform and two other young Italian men got involved. We had no idea what the conversation was about but "Polizia" was mentioned a lot and it seemed the train workers were threatening to call the "polizia" on the young kids too. At one point, one of the workers sort of shoved the young kid in the blue shirt and the other young observers started to act aggressively like they were going to brawl with the train workers. We were starting to get very nervous and Derek finally asked one of the young kids listening in if we needed to just go ahead and pay. He said yes, he thought that would be best, but then he said "Wait" and he finished listening to the conversation. Then, amazingly, the train workers went down the stairs and left. We all were looking around thinking they were going to call the police but the kids said we were okay to go!!
We later found out that the argument that the young kid had posed on our behalf was that this form of extortion on tourists was detrimental to the Italian economy and Americans would not return if this happened. We went to find the main translator in blue but we couldn't find him anywhere - he had completely disappeared. We asked his friends and they said they had never seen him before - he wasn't with them as we had initially thought. My theory is that he was our guardian angel. I tried to pay the young kids for their help but they refused any money. They did agree to pose in a picture with us though! We made it onto our next train and made it back to the boat with just a few minutes to spare.
Once on the boat, we found that many people ended up paying the 50 Euro, some paid 5 Euro and some surrendered their passport information and were told they would be sent a bill for 200 Euro and would not be let into Italy again until they paid! It seems that scare tactics work pretty well on Americans!! Had we been by ourselves and not in a group of 6, I am sure we would have paid. Cinque Terre was a beautiful place to visit and I think I would like to go back and visit the villages we missed on this trip but we will definitely make sure to validate our train ticket!!

The two guys in the middle were the two Italians that joined in our argument part way through. We never saw the guy in blue again though.

If only the consequences of not validating your train ticket were as explicit as these signs of what would happen if you don't follow the rules :) Maybe the first sign is "No one-legged men allowed".... who knows.