So, we woke up in Cadiz, Spain! We ordered breakfast room service because we didn’t want to wake up any earlier to go to the dining room. It arrived right on time and we gulped it down. We are doing a good job observing our cruising rules to not gaining weight. There are primarily two rules: always take the stairs and eat a ton of fruit and veggies every day.
The stairs trick is legit because our room is on 12, the dining room is on 6, the pool is on 16 and the bars are 5, 6, or 7. We’re pretty much running up and down all day. The other day I think we hit 125 flights of stairs just that day. Whew!
Anyway, we were soon walking off the boat in Cadiz! We booked an excursion to see the town and do a sherry tasting at a very famous winery, Sandeman. The bus tours can be quite the…duel with patience. Everyone is slow. Several people are always very grumpy if not flat rude. It’s not my favorite way to tour but sometimes it checks all the boxes.
The town was really nice- a beautiful city with tons of history. It was a cloudy day and in an area known for 300+ days of sunshine, the locals were thrilled with the chance for a drizzle and we weren’t too upset either!
The sherry tour was really well done. A man explained the entire process of making the kinds of sherry they produced. The winery was really nice with beautiful paintings of the wine making process, writings, pictures, etc. It was pretty hard to hear at times because our tour guide was soft spoken and the winery was very large. We might have missed a few things, but it was still a great visit.
At the end, we sat in a large room and got to have three tastes. A light, dry sherry, an amber sherry (not too sweet) and then we got to pick our 3rd and I went with the brandy. Our table mates were awesome. We had a couple from LA whose daughter and son-in-law are cruisers with a nice boat in Marina del Ray. And another couple from Indiana. That gentleman used to work for McDonnell Douglas and Boeing in St. Louis! I’ve somehow already forgotten what area he worked in, but not the same as my dad. At one point, we were all telling stories about our dogs and sharing photos of them. Humanity!
As we were getting up to leave, Richard, our Irish buddy, came up to find us because he said he was sitting with someone at his table who said they were our neighbor! We went to meet her- a sweet older lady who, sure enough, lives in Atascadero which is the town just to the south of Paso. She’s very into wine so we enjoyed meeting her and telling her about Nicora.
After, we were back on the bus heading back into town. Our bus tour guide did such a great job telling us about the tremendous fishing industry in Cadiz that we knew we needed to walk around and find a spot for some great lunch and wine. We strolled past a lot of places trying to figure it all out. There is such a country specific culture with restaurants that you don’t realize until you’re in another country. Do we just walk in and sit down? Do we wait to be seated? Will anyone speak English? How big are the portions? Some places seemed to only serve coffee. Some only wine. Some both.
After a bit, I found a place that looked really promising and I could read some of the menu! We went in and the owner was terrific- very patient. Spoke enough English to fill in the gaps. Helped us pick out some tuna, ham croquettes, foie gras, chicken. All tapas- so small plates. Just a couple of bites each. We asked about wine and he said, “local wine?” So we said, “YES!” And man did he hook us up! I took photos of the bottles because I knew I’d never remember by end of trip. So, there we sat, feeling quite European with our ridiculously delicious tapas and local wines. The people watching was great. Another very clean, respectful, vibrant, bustling yet not really crowded place.
We do continue to be surprised by how many people here smoke. There are so few smokers in Paso I could probably forget people do it!
COVID-wise, everyone wears a mask when inside. No one wears one outside. On the ship, the crew are all wearing the very high end KN-95 masks all day, every day. I feel bad for their faces! Masks are optional for guests and people do whatever works for them with zero issues. We always have ours but generally are not wearing them unless we’re in a crowded area or near someone hacking up a lung. The boat cleaning crew is off the charts. You can swing a cat without hitting someone wiping down every surface. We’re just making sure we wash our hands a lot, using sanitizer after holding the hand rails on the stairs, and generally trying to not be all up in other people’s faces. So far, so good.
The next morning, we were up drinking coffee in our room and the captain came on the loudspeaker. We knew something was up because a) we NEVER hear announcements in the cabin- they protect that and b) it was 6:30 AM. Turns out, the wind was blowing like heck to the point that even with extra tugboats, there was no way our boat was going to be able to swing into port. There would be no visit to Malaga! Poop! He warned that with this type of weather, we might miss another port or two. They were doing everything they could, and would keep us posted.
Now, we both immediately felt so bad for the crew! They’d already dealt with us for 7 straight days at sea! Imagine how annoying people had probably gotten!! And now they were stuck again with us AND we could just imagine them all scrambling in that very moment to come up with things for 1200 people to do all day!!
By 10:00, we had a completely new “princess patter”, which is our daily listing of activities. The amazing crew and thrown together a whole slew of things to keep people moving and grooving. We didn’t do any of those- we were wanting to sit outside by the pool but according to the captain, doing so might blow you right into the Mediterranean, so we decided to stay inside. What we did do was try to be extra nice to the beleaguered crew who really appreciated it.
A bit later in the afternoon, the captain came back on the speaker with the bad news - no way we’d make it to Cartagena either:( Poop! But then he said - now for the good news! He was able to negotiate for us to arrive in Mallorca a day early and stay over night. Woohoo!! This was a big task because all the cruise ships are in the same, ahem, boat. So, getting one of the spots was a big deal. High five, captain!
Now, of course, no one had an excursion planned because we didn’t know we’d be there. Imagine the poor shore excursion crew! Whew! We decided we would just roam around. We were sitting in Vines drinking a bunch of French wine and we saw our Irish buddies come in. We decided to ask if they wanted to meet up for lunch or dinner in town the next day. They seemed flattered and accepted right away. Sweet!
With that, we meandered down to dinner. Our latest routine is to hit up James in Vines before we go to the room and he’ll let us sneak the good glasses and good wine up. They will deliver wine to your room, but the menus are all different for every place, including room service, and we’ve had them all by now and have ruled them out.
We were excited for our Mallorca walking adventures the next day with Richard and Siobhan.
No comments:
Post a Comment