Barcelona, Spain

Barcelona, Spain Day 1

We finally did it!  We had a true beach day!  This time we took a tour through the ship.  There is something to be said not to have to book, haggle, and research anything.  Just show up and they do all the work.  We opted for the one titled “Strolling through Sitges and bathing at the beach”   There is quite an interesting fact about Sitges, but I will just continue for now.

About a 50 minute drive and we were there.  All piling out of the bus our tour guide herded us like sheep to form a little group to follow him.  The four of us looked at each other, and ditched the group.  We just went to the beach.  They have quite a cool concept in Spain/Greece.  There are chairs and umbrellas that are there that you rent for the day.  Greece was reasonable at 10 Euros for 4 chairs and two umbrellas.  Spain on the other had been super expensive.  For the same thing it was 36 Euros for the day.  Bah – Tim will just have to work harder when we get home.  It was a nice beach. The sand was super hot, but there were nice waves coming in to play in.  Vhari and Tim were in heaven!  They were always easy to find as Vhari’s legs were the only thing that were usually out of the water.  She was forever driving or just hanging upside down. Travis and I just chilled in the shade drinking slurpees.  The beach was packed with beautiful people, and a lot of the women were topless.  This was something that was totally freaky for Travis and Vhari.  Tim also gave us a running commentary on which ones should be covered up. Haha.  Also, we noticed that there was a lot of really attractive men in little Speedo’s walking around all greased up with sun screen – tanned, toned.  Well here is the interesting fact about Stiges....it is the number one vacation spot in the world for same sex couples.  If you could have heard the blue haired ladies on the bus ride home......priceless. 

We had a quick shower and dinner on the ship before heading back out into Barcelona for the night.  Travis opted out for this (he made the right move) It was a Mecca of shopping with some cool buildings thrown it.  It was unbelievably busy as 6 other cruise ships are here as well.  All they have told us for the last couple of days is watch your belongings in Barcelona.  You can imagine that I had the death grip on my bag as we walked around last night.

The ship had shuttles available to take you back to the ship.  When we arrived at the pickup point, there were 200 people waiting in line for the bus.  I walked up to the front of the line, and there was a sign that the shuttled stopped at 10:00p (it was now 9:55p) I went back to Tim, and we listened to everyone bitch about the bus service, and they would give Holland America a piece of their minds......then Tim “SAVED THE DAY” as he sang for the next 30 minutes and took a cab back.  9 Euros – home safe and sound.  Just on a side note – Vhari rented a movie when we got back, and she just sat there in amazement of all the passengers yelling at the front office about the bussing situation..........we were all going to go down just to watch that – that would be a movie we have not seen.

Tomorrow we are splitting up again.  As noted above we did find the shopping area so I will be following around Vhari in 33 degree heat as she finds the perfect outfit gripping my bag jet again with the death grip.  The boys will find the train tour have lunch, and just hang out.