Adjaccio - 20 April 2015

So there's me thinking I had finished with blogging about the cruise.  And then I realised I had forgotten to include my write up on Adjaccio which came after Livorno and before Barcelona!

So here it is ....

How lovely waking up to blue skies in Corsica.  The ship pulls in to a pretty harbour while we are eating breakfast. 

I don't know much about Corsica, but Napoleon Bonaparte was born here in Adjaccio.

It's lovely to see from our balcony that we are very close to a lot of cafes.  We can also see an open air market being set up

We leave the ship and take a short walk over to the market.  It's a food market full of colourful produce.

Spoilt dog being fed sweets 

Pooch wants more

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Andy buys some olives and cheese and wine.  It all looks lush.

Sun-dried tomatoes

We find a cafe overlooking the harbour and enjoy a nice coffee.  It is a real treat to be sitting outside in the hot sun on a Sunday morning.  I feel blessed to be here

P&O Britannia looking beautiful

Napoleon

People were getting ready to listen to some French folk music and eat.  I love seeing the ship from land.  It is so huge

We go back to the ship after wandering around

We spend the afternoon sunbathing on our balcony.  Andy drinks his wine and we eat cheese and olives for our lunch.  It's lovely to look at the harbour and Adjaccio

Ship now leaving the harbour

Goodbye Adjaccio

I hope we come back one day

Tomorrow we are arriving in Barcelona, Spain.  We've always wanted to go there.  Hope it's as warm as it's been today.   

At dinner tonight, Sanjoe, our waiter gave us a warning to beware of pickpockets in Barcelona.  Don't let anyone get close, don't wear jewellery and keep wallets and purses within your clothing in front of you.  Wow, I'm wondering why, if pickpockets are so well known about, Spain hasn't tried to clamp down on them especially in well known tourist spots where they hang out.

Okay so this is the link to take you to my post on Barcelona as I somehow got my posts mixed up.  I wanted to insert this post inbetween my posts on Livorno and Barcelona but I need to do a few tutorials first and I haven't got time.

Thank you for reading ...

Day 11 - 3 days at Sea on way home to Southampton

We now have 3 days left of the cruise.  Here are a few photos we took over that time.

Another beautiful sunrise through the cabin windows

Mr Relax chilling

Happy in the sun

A couple of nights before the end of the cruise we had a special dinner called the Chef's Parade.  The 16 chefs who had cooked for us during the whole cruise would parade through the dining room so we could show our appreciation

One last pre-dinner selfie

We had a lovely dinner and we all took photos of each other.

Here is Sheila and Maureen our table companions

And Jen with her mother Louis

Our table

Our lovely waiters Sanjoe and Gaston who worked tirelessly to make our dining experiences so special

The great Chefs who created delicious meals for us.  They were cheered.  We were given a copy of all the menus we received during the cruise

What a great time we had.  It's sad it's come to an end and the 2 weeks flew by so quickly.Hopefully I will be blogging about another cruise in the near future.  

And until then, I'll be blogging about anything else I get up to.

UPDATE:  Oh dear, oh dear I have just realised I forgot to include Adjaccio which should  have come after the day we went to Livorno.  I'd written it up and forgot to include it.  Ok, that will be the next post after this.

Thank you for reading ....

Day 10 - Valencia - 21 April 2015

While sitting by the windows, eating breakfast, we see this beautiful sunrise

And then, wow, what a wonderful sight!!

It brings us a beautiful hot day here at Valencia.  The ship sails into port and we stop right by a parking lot.  You can already see the coaches arriving to take people off on tours.  Hopefully there will be transport for us

Here is a picture of another fabulous gangway that is soooo easy to use to get off the ship.  Thank you P&O.  

We see the queues for the buses and are directed to one with wheelchair access.  There is already one gentleman waiting to be lifted on and we are next.  An elderly lady pushing her husband in a wheelchair tries to push in front of us but we weren't going to let her!  Anyway there was plenty of room on this coach.  I'm so impressed with it.  How come the UK doesn't have decent coaches with wheelchair access?  Well done, Spain, you are brilliant!

We have a lovely drive through Valencia which is like a mini tour in itself, and takes around 20 minutes before drop off.  It looks like a  beautiful city.  

I really love the architecture and the pavements are easy for me to get around.  

The beginning of the visit is almost a disaster when Andy loses me.  He was taking photos and I was in front of him.  We were intending to go straight up ahead.  While he was taking photos, I got chatting to fellow passengers from the ship.  They gave me a map and told me what was up ahead.  Minutes later  I turned around to show Andy the map and he was nowhere in sight!  I looked up and down and around and no Andy.

I didn't panic straight away but suddenly the realisation of being abandoned in Valencia was slowly sinking in.  I daren't look for him in a shop in case he came looking for me so I decided to just stay put and hoped he would turn up.  I only waited a minute or so.

Suddenly I saw him running down the road looking for me!  Phew!!!!!!  It was sooooo good to see him, I felt very relieved.  He had walked right passed me after taking photos and didn't see me even though he was looking for me and I hadn't moved from my original spot.   

Anyway, he had good news for me.  While looking for me he discovered another Ale-Hop shop that we liked so much in Alicante.  You can't miss it with it's trademark cow standing in the doorway  We bought quite a bit here.  It's full of just about everything.

We carried on up the road to a big square with the Cathedral of Santa Maria

Right in the middle of this district is the Plaza de la Virgin, an old little square that dates back to Roman times.  It is surrounded by the Cathedral of Santa Maria, the Basilica de la Virgen de los Desamparados and the Palace of the Generalitat.  

This is a perfect spot for eating and drinking.  We stop at a cafe in the hot sun, drink coffee and eat a toasted croissant with jam .... heaven!

In the square is an elaborate fountain with Neptune lying in it, surrounded by 8 naked women.  This was created by local sculptor Silvestre Edeta and it represents Valencia's Turia River and it's eight irrigation ditches.

Neptune with his nymphets

Octaganol Bell Tower El Micalet

El Micalet Bell Tower

Cathedral of Santa Maria

We discover the beautiful food market Mercado Central filled with the most delicious looking food and authentic Valencian produce.  

Mercado Central - food market

Buildings outside the market

Andy bought lots of olives and cheese and some beer

Food market domed ceiling

After we looked for a place to have lunch

We found somewhere lovely in the hot sun to have beer and tapas

Cheers

We managed to get through huge queues to our shuttle bus and make our way back to the ship.  There were geranium lined roads, very pretty

On the way back I took a selfie to see what Andy was up to behind me

Spying on Andy

view from the coach

Evening selfie

Tommorow is the start of our journey back to Southampton, England. We have three days at sea.  I'll cover them in one more post about the cruise . I'll be showing some pictures of friends we met and our lovely waiters and any other photos I forgot to show.  Thank you for reading ...