| OUR FRIENDS, TONY AND JEAN FROM CANADA |
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| We met these friends while we were living in Mexico. |
The 14th of April, Tony and Jean, Ron and I flew from Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico to Barsalona, Spain for a Mediterrean Cruise.
On the 15th we boarded the ship in the early afternoon. The ship set sail for our first port.
On the 16th we docked at the city a Villafranche, France...near Nice, (the French Riviera). We went into this city and took the bus through Monaco and stopped in Monte Carlo. The scenery here is very beautiful, people very well dressed and large, expensive cars. We saw the casino there but didn't go in......there is a charge of 10 euros. A bowl of soup was also 10 euros.
The 17th we docked at Livorno, Italy. There was a guided tour or a, what they called " you look" tour. We took the you look tour. On this tour we took a hour and a half bus trip on the expressway to the city of Florence. Once we got to this city they gave us a map, told us where and what time to meet the bus for the trip back to where the ship was docked. The temperature on this day was about 60 degrees.
On the 18th we docked at Civitavecchia, Italy. We took another "you look" tour to Rome. Again the bus trip was a hour and a half. We could walk to all the places that we wanted to see. We saw St. Peter's Square, the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, the Fountain of Trevi. We walked passed the President's Palance. Lunch for the 4 of us was pizza, spagetti, wine, beer, and bottled water.....total 38 euros. Bottled water....4 euros, beer.......4 euros, soup 7.20 euros. There is a lot of traffic in Rome....very small cars, also a very large amount of scooters that weave in and out of the traffic. The sun was shinning and the temperatures was very pleasant for site seeing.
The 19th of April we docked at Naples. From here we took a 40 minutes boat ride to the Isle of Capri. We wanted to take another boat to go and see the Blue Grotto but the tide was in. So we took a hour boat ride around the insland. The water here is the most beautiful color blue that I have ever seen.
Saturday we docked at 12:00 noon in Valletta, Malta. Malta is a group of five islands.....2 of them are uninhabited. The habor is natural, not man made. It is a beautiful harbor with all the building new and old the built out of a sandy colored block. There aren't many trees on the island that we visited. The people here speak Maltese and English. These islands were once part of the English Commonwealth. We traveled by bus to 3 cities that over lap each other. The cities are fortified cities that were built between 1500-1700AD. The city of Mdina was built on the highest point of this island. That afternoon we set sail to go back to Barsalong across the Mediterrenean. The water was a little choppy and the ship rocked a bit. Jean was seasick but Tony, Ron, and I didn't have any trouble. That evening at supper the dinning room was only half full.
On the 22nd after sailing all night the ship docked at Barsalona. We left the ship at 10:30am. Then we flew to Madrid, Spain
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