Ok now that you have been in our shoes for a while through that last post, we are actually going to talk about the vacation.
Kyle's parents took us on an awesome mediterranean cruise. The cruise left from Barcelona on a Sunday and we decided for our one year anniversary we would go up a few days early to celebrate while hanging out in Barcelona. The day we got there we walked around the streets near our hotel. We ran onto the street Las Ramblas, which is the trademark street. Then we found our way into the market, La Boqueria. It was amazing. Fresh fruit, fish, meat, veggies, etc. We tried to find some turkish delight but there was none to be found, unfortunately for Layne {t.d. is her favorite sweet and she's been obsessed with it since she first had it in Istanbul last year. It's nowhere to be found in Tulsa...} Next we went for a stroll down a side street and stumbled upon our to-be stomping grounds for the next day and a half. Pastry shops, awesome boutiques, rustic taverns all next to typical Spanish squares. We walked all along this area and explored all of the cool alleys {and eventually found an Irish Pub on the last day we were there..have to go there next year with the Dulleas}.
La Boqueria
So, it's our first day there and we're just walking around, checking the sights, and of course we've done our due diligence, we read all about pickpockets and sneaky Spanish thieves. We read about the people who drop money in front of you and a cohort takes money from ya pockets. We read about the who bird-poo on ya shoulder trick. We read 'em all and believe me, we were aware...
So we're walking along, down a busy little street and all of the sudden, this crazy dark haired, mini-Spaniard wearing white linen Hammer pants confronted us and did a quick hip shake, double side-step and mumbled some crazy sounding Spanish phrase {we would swear that he said "how do you like my dance moves?" in a thick catalan accent}. If you see us, ask us to do our impersonation of the rogue dancer and see if it matches with what you imagined. Natch, we stopped dead in our tracks, half flabergasted and trying not to burst out laughing... and half making sure we had our wallets. I mean, the last thing we wanted was to end up on a travel blog being the first victims of the new dance-inspired theft. No worries, we still had everything intact.
After the dance encounter, our evening wound down. We got some quick food and some clothes to wear for the next day {see previous post for deets} and then hit the hay. The next morn we got up, had an awesome breakfast complete with potato omelette, speck ham, salami, all kinds of cheeses, coffee, pastries, a variety of jams and, much to Layne's surprise and joy, nutella. We got our luggage from the front desk then set out on our journey to the Sagrada Familia. We love to walk all over the cities that we go to 'cause that's the best way to see a city, in our opinion. So for our day of Gaudi, we made the trek to Sagrada Familia and on to Park Guell after that and finished the tour by walking down Passeig de Gracia and seeing La Pedrera. Gaudi was certainly one weird dude, totally reminds us of Alice in Wonderland stuff.
At Park Guell
Sagrada Familia is one amazing place. The detail all over the place is astounding and it's so different from any other church/basilica that we've seen. Instead of all kinds of gold/silver/jewel embellishments, the architecture really takes center stage. We could stay in there for days and can't wait to go back. Park Guell is cool too, a little fairytale-esque, but had great views of Barca.
Ceiling.
After walking all over the city, we went back to the hotel and then got a quick bite for dinner. After we eat, since the weather was just astounding, we got a couple pastries and a bottle of cava and headed up to to our hotel rooftop. It was the perfect ending to a busy day about the city.
Favorite pastry shop.
Hotel Terrace on our last night in Barcelona.
In the morning we went running down Las Ramblas, got some great breakfast, walked about the city and then headed to the port to catch a boat. Holy carp the boat was way huge. It was docked next to the boat we took for our honeymoon cruise {which, at the time, we thought was massive} and our new boat dwarfed our ex-boat.
We were on the Norwegian Epic, and it had so much stuff to do. A rundown of the things we did: watched a cirque show, went to a teppenyaki, hung out in an irish bar a lot, hot tubbed it like crazy, relaxed in the spa often, sang along to some howl at the moon, froze our feet off at the ice bar, ate at myriad restaurants, went to a jazz and blues bar, etc. It was a great boat. The two best things about the cruise ship were the spa and the cirque show. Kyle's parents got us access to the spa for the week as an anniversary gift. It was a much used gift because we were there pretty much every day {& all day on days at sea}. Steam room, sauna, massive whirlpool, hot tiled beds and awesome sea-side beds. It was sooooo relaxing. The cirque show was called cirque: dinner & dreams, and was a show that went on during a dinner {obv} but it was so hard to eat because we were watching the show the whole time. The people were 100% muscle and had incredible balance. It was one of the most amazing shows we've ever seen, and the food was pretty good too.


The jackets they give you to go into the Ice Bar. It was -12 degrees.
Funny story. Since it was the first formalish night {the Epic has "freestyle" dining, so you don't ever have to dress up, but you can if you want} and Kyle wore a bowtie, natch. Layne and Kyle's parents were joking that because he was wearing the bowtie, he was gonna get called up onstage during the Cirque show to participate. Sure enough, about 25 minutes into the show, Kyle gets a tap on his shoulder and it's a performer asking him to go up onstage. He had balloons placed in his hands and between his legs, was blindfolded and the ring master used a whip to pop the balloons...K not really. They used a pin to pop when Kyle couldn't see. But he was wise to it.
So our first port was Livorno and we went on an excursion to the Cinque Terre. There were some amazing views and the towns were picturesque. In Vernazza we got some fresh pizza with tomato sauce, mozzarella and pesto and it was probably the best pizza we've ever had. We still dream about that pizza. We had some time to walk around Monterosso and it was such a cozy town.
Our next port was rome and so we went to a couple churches (San Pietro in Vincoli and Gesu) and then hit the pubs. We first went to Scholar's Lounge right next to Gesu and then headed to Trinity College, after walking through Piazza Navona. We had to go to Trinity College because that's the pub that we got our first drink in Rome on our honeymoon! It was a pretty fun, relaxing time in Rome 'cause we love to just casually walk through cities. Coincidence: in Trinity College pub, we ran into a guy named Brooks who was from Ft. Worth, went to OU and now works in Saudi Arabia teaching Engrish. What a crazy coincidence, eh?
Pantheon had no scaffolding!
Our third stop was Naples and we had a hired driver by the name of Paolo who was so funny, witty, informative and accommodating throughout the day. We first started off the day by worrying about what time we would get back to the ship and if we'd have enough time to return. Paolo advised not worry because if we miss the boat we can stay with his grandma who "makes air emissions in the night just like the queen." He also mentioned that street signs are merely suggestions. Our first stop was Pompeii and it was crazy to see how huge the city was. We both thought it was a tiny little town but it was actually a huge complex.


After Pompeii we drove to the Amalfi coast and stopped in Positano for some quick shopping and amazing lunch. This was Paolo's suggestion for lunch because it had everything: the best italian food we've ever eaten, an amazing view of the sea, affordable, and great wine. It was family style and there were probably ten appetizers to eat. Meatballs and beans, fresh mozza and speck, grilled cherry tomatoes, roasted eggplant among other things. All of them were just so tasty. For entrees we got pumpkin pasta, lasagna, gnocchi and another type of homemade pasta. It was all so good but the pumpkin was especially scrumptious; we're definitely gonna try to recreate it at home. Dessert was huge and amazing, just like everything else and then we got shots of limoncello. Yuck. That shnoz is the most disgusting alcohol ever created. It's like they put a half shot of everclear on top of a half shot of lemon simple syrup. When you tilt the glass you sniff the potent alcohol and sip the super sweet syrup. It's truly wretched. It's supposed to help digestion. Hmm, yeah right.




We kept driving and saw Amalfi and Ravello, bought a couple souvenirs and then headed back to the boat. It was about an hour and a half drive back, and Paolo kept us entertained with his antics the whole time. Topics ranged from Italian history, wine, transvestites {"lady boys with surprise parts"}, our Aunt Kim, tomatoes, Vesuvius, etc. Melissa also had the idea to try to teach him some english slang. We think she's just a little behind on her current slang because she started with "da bomb" and then moved on to "word up." So we took the lead on this and taught Paolo "that's what she said." He didn't get it at first but when after a couple examples, he thought it was hilarious. After our trip with him ended we kept thinking that he's back at an italian bar with his buddies trying to relate this joke..."these are the things she says to him...", "she said that to him...", "he heard her say that..." We hope he remembers the proper wording.


The last port we stopped at was Palma, Mallorca. When we docked, we had heard that it was a slow 35-min walk from the port to the city center. We love to walk all over the place in cities that we go to so we we're all like, "oh yeah, 35 mins for grandma and grandpa is like 20 for us...this will be great!" Plus, we could see the cathedral {inside designed by Gaudi} from our room and we were a little skeptical, but we decided to go for it. So we set out for the cathedral and as we start grinding, the cathedral doesn't seem to be getting any closer. In fact, we regretted choosing to walk as soon as we set our feet on the sidewalk. But, eventually we made it to city center {a hour later, so whoever said 35 mins was crazy}. Turns out, there's some great shopping in Palma and Layne was in love with all the shops {this was kind of the story of the trip for all of the cities}. So we walked around, got some pastries, Estrella and then met up with Kyle's parents to check out the cathedral and grab some lunch.
Side note: at the place where we ate lunch, Layne spied a jug of nutella that was literally the size of her head. Scratch that. Bigger than her head. Swears.
We walked back to the ship {more like trudged along, but we got to look at some sweet sailboats and yachts while doing it} and then got ready for our last dinner on the boat. Sad, we know but we were excited to get back and see our dog {k, that actually might be more sad}. The cruise was really great though and we saw some amazing places. We're very blessed to have great parents/parents-in-law that do this for us!
Fortunately, there's no crazy story about the plane rides back home. We made all of our connections. We weren't held up in customs. Our luggage made it all the way home. We've never been so relieved for a normal flight experience. Only bad note: we left our bathing suits on the cruise ship.. and they don't know where they are. We'll get it figured out though.
So, our two last posts have been essays and if you're still with us, God bless you. We'll hit ya with some pet-centric posts pretty soon. Perfect.