Monday, February 16

Day at sea. And thank goodness, because I had a deadline. I did about 6 hours of work in my floating office, then emailed my document from off the coast of Sardinia. Sounds kind of glamorous, doesn’t it?

I ran downstairs to meet Mark for afternoon trivia. On our previous cruise together, Mark and I won the trivia championship. Though this was only an early round, there was a huge crowd -- mostly of old folks who ought to have learned a thing or two over the years. Nonetheless, we had a respectable second place finish. You old farts just wait until there are questions we actually like.

Mark and I marveled at how calm the waters were, and gave a little shout out to Poseidon. Then we reverted back to the usual ungrateful human state, by drinking, gambling and staying up too late.

Sunday, February 15

On Sunday morning we woke up sore (was it the three flights, or the horrible hotel bed?) and disoriented (wait, what?). After spending top Euro for a not-top breakfast, we visited the Sagrada Familia church. We got there by taxi, and I had the most enjoyable non-conversation ever with our driver. He spoke no English, and more Catalan than Spanish, so my meager skills weren’t much use either. Still, I learned that the Sagrada Familia will not be completed for another 20 years. I’ve seen it pictured from a distance many times, but the beauty is in the details.
Crazy, WTF details.

Mark wanted to find a couple of geo-caches, so I saved Las Ramblas for after the cruise. After a quick cuppa in a café (excuse me if I don't shake hands),

we walked to the Arc de Triomf (yep, they’ve got one too),
and into the Gothic quarter.

Big urban parks, and narrow cobbled streets. My kind of town!

We circled back to the hotel via the zoo, the outdoor ping-pong tables, and the Olympic Village (where the athletes stayed, not the stadium). I look forward to seeing more of Barcelona.

I’d been having weird dreams about missing the ship, so I was happy to get over there earlier than necessary. By 3:00 we were sitting on our cabin balcony, sipping champagne. Mark had arranged that little treat. I must have said “I’m so relieved” about 9 times. Then I met our next-door neighbors over the balcony partition. They came in that morning, but their luggage did not. If they’re lucky, it will turn up in two days when we stop in Italy.

I'm so relieved.

Friday, February 13 -- Saturday, February 14

Like heirs to the throne, Mark and I left Columbus on separate planes. He refuses to fly on certain planes (which he’s perfectly content to let me fly on, by the way). To his credit, though, the man made up for it by getting us a day pass to the American Airlines Lounge at O’Hare. It was very nice and comfy, and I got 2 hours’ worth of work done.

Then we got on our flight to Brussels, and both were lucky enough to have empty seats next to us. But it was still Coach, and we are still big people -- so other than a brief nap, neither of us slept. Arriving crabby and pouting, we needed a pick-me-up. For Mark that was an egg sandwich and a Hoegaarden beer. (Gross.) For me, it was a Speck (bacon) e Brie hot flatbread/sandwich. Expensive, but delish.

I’d like to take just een moment to discuss Flemish.
It looks like a mix between German and Dutch, but with a kind of slurred pronunciation like that of a drunken French farmer.

Of course, the other language spoken in Belgium is French. A Flemish separatist crossed out the French words on this sign. It seems to be a prickly subject, and I'm not getting involved.

We had a plane to catch. Some unlucky African man was seated between Mark and me. He tried to ignore us by reading his French newspaper. We tried to ignore his B.O.

Arrived in Barcelona and could not check in to our hotel right away. So we wandered around for an hour, and found a grocery store called Consum, where I got my nerd on. I love visiting groceries stores when I travel, and I had even more fun trying to recall my Spanish vocab. That goes back 30 years, yo!

Then we slept for 17 hours.