Today is a our last day in Barcelona. It’s a day of chores: laundry and packing, and presenting our tired selves at the pier to board our ship for home. Yes, you read that right – we are sailing home, across the Atlantic, just like days of yore. Very civilized with respect to time changes across the planet. We have a few excursions in and around Spain, then we set off for several days at sea until our arrival in Florida. Then it’s back to modern transportation as we fly to the west coast. We’ve already met a few of our shipmates, thanks to the good offices of the internet and cruise forums. We had a great time at Montserrat, but I don’t seem to have many pictures of the group. There were six of us. Here’s me and Rick with Nita:
and here’s me at the end of this day:
Who’s a tired traveler, hmmm? In my defense, this was our third day in a row of over ten-mile walks/hikes. Whew!
Yesterday we had an awesome guided tour with another couple, Dare and Philip.
Dare arranged a guided tour with Gregorio Arribas, who took us to a church built around a cave in Monserr, where the founder of the Jesuit order had his inspiration. I thought the cave part was really cool. After that, Gregory took us to Oller Winery, where they produce organic (yay!) wine in a thousand-year old castle. They gave us the most amazing wine-and-tapas tasting. Our tasting included the last bottle of a 1000-bottle production. We bought a bottle of their most popular wine, a 2007 Merlot blend, with the intent of saving it for our 20th wedding anniversary. That’s in eight years, folks. Someone remind me! Here’s a picture of the tasting:
After the tasting, Gregory took us to lunch at La Vinya Nova, a farmhouse restaurant nestled at the foot of Montserrat. For about five hundred years, this farm provided most of the food for the monastery, but about a hundred years ago they converted to a public restaurant. They are out in the middle of nowhere, but serve up to 150 people a day, and about 600 on weekends. Wow! It was delicious food and I ate all of it despite being full from the tapas tasting. I paid for it later, but you have to splurge sometimes,right?
Rick and Gregory at La Vinya Nova
After this, Gregory graciously dropped us off at a tapas bar back in Barcelona, where we met up with a “bonus grandchild” we haven’t seen for about seven years. Lauren is studying in Barcelona for a semester. She’s grown into a beautiful, confident woman. So good to see!
I did NOT eat any more food! Rick and I shared a bottle of water. It’s all we could manage by this point.
Internet will be scarce while we’re on the ship, so I don’t guarantee any posts or pictures while we’re at sea. Maybe a Facebook posting now and then. I’ll see you all on the other side!
Marlene Dotterer 
Traveling can be grueling on the body with all the moving, shaking, walking and hiking. Tired? Understandable, but looks like such a wonderful time being had 🙂
You do look tired, but man, what a trip!!
Have a safe journey home.
Good choice. Enjoy the voyage. I’ll look forward to hearing about it. I sailed on the Queen Mary in 1958 from Southampton at a time when transatlantic voyages were quickly losing ground to air travel.
So glad you had such a wonderful time. For a moment there, I was confused wondering how you got to the Caribbean from Barcelona–there’s an island here called Monsterrat lol. I’m just back from Canada myself. Will be posting later!