It’s embarkation day and we have nothing to do all morning except organize the suitcases and head to the ship. We’re up early as usual, and take a walk around the neighborhood instead of the gym. It’s too nice a day to stay inside. We stroll past the Cathedral – which is only steps away from the hotel – then wander down along the walls to the Placa del Rei, turning onto Carrer de Jaume I to head back to La Rambla. It’s the long way around, but its a nice morning walk in the warm sunshine. We hit the Carrefour for ship snacks, then head back toward the hotel, stopping at a cute little cafe for 2 Euro cappuccino/croissant combinations. (Oh, white chocolate croissants! Our new favorite)
Back at the hotel, its an easy organization, and we’re packed and ready to go in no time. Check out, ask for a taxi (we are 3rd in line – the other 2 going to the same place – and the guy at the desk says it will be at least 1/2 hour. Well, so be it. We’re in no real rush –so we wait. There’s some young guy helping with the taxis, and when one couple wants to wait outside, he tells him they shouldn’t be out there with their bags, it’s better inside. We’re not quite sure of the reason, but they listen and stay in the lobby. The taxis for the first 2 couples come fairly quickly, and still we wait. The young guy gets distracted with some guests and bags, so he’s not there to help us anymore. We notice 2 cabs come by and seem to stop, so we go outside with out bags. We wave to one guy and ask if he was called – and he pantomimes, not phone call. Ok, not our guy. We wait a while more – then another cab comes by, and we ask him the same thing, he says no, but say the hell with it. Why are we waiting when these cabs are available? So we tell him we are going to the port and load the bags into the trunk. He keeps asking terminal 1 or 2? We keep saying no, pier B. After a couple of minutes we all realize we are talking about 2 different things – he thinks we are going to the airport, when we’re talking about the sea port! Finally straightened out (crucero), we head off to the port without delay.
Check in is super simple. We walk right up, get our keys and walk right on. Couldn’t be easier. Since we are in a suite (aft sky suite), we know we can go to Michael’s club to wait until Luminae opens at 11:30, so we just head there. As we wind our way through the “duty free” shopping there is a group clustered near the entrance to the escalators, essentially blocking everyone’s progress. They say something about waiting for someone, but we’re just trying to find a path around them, which we eventually do and walk through the drink package, dining package, photograph gauntlet to get to the escalators. As we approach, the group is being let through to the escalator with an escort who ends up behind us. As it turns out, these folks are suite guests and the escort is taking them to Michael’s, oh, so we lucked into that. As it turns out though, they’re taking the elevator – and we are so not doing that – so we walk up on our own and just go sit down in the lounge for our first look at our fellow suite mates, which, let’s just say, doesn’t surprise us.
At the appropriate time, we wander into Luminae and have a lovely lunch, at the back of the restaurant, with Miro (who we are certain we’ve had serve us before on some ship), in what will end up being our section for dinner every night! Finally, we are released to our cabins, and we walk down the long, long hallway to the aft end of the ship and our sky suite. It’s actually hidden behind this plain door (with no numbers or identification on it) that opens up into a vestibule that gives access to our cabin and the balcony cabin next to us. Weird – but for a family, probably pretty cool, you can just open your doors and use the “lobby” area as a convenient way to go between rooms.
Our room is by far the best sky suite we’ve ever had! It’s huge, with a nice big couch and a huge round porthole shaped window looking out the starboard side of the ship. The bathroom has a big tub with rainfall shower head. And the balcony is also big with a little wrap around on the side, 2 chairs and ottomans, plus a nice big table. The only negatives are that there isn’t much cover on the balcony which may make sun and rain a problem, and there are 2 big poles in the room – one right by the bed and one by the bathroom. If we can keep from running into them at night – we’ll be totally happy campers all the way across the Atlantic!
After waiting a while for our bags, we decide to go wander up to the gym to see just how far away it really is (the complete opposite end of the ship). As we are walking down the hall, we spy our bags which we immediately grab and come back to the room to unpack. Sweet save! Then it’s gym time (with tons of bags still in the hall – so we were right to grab ours!), first night in Michael’s (not so bad, crowded by not uncomfortable), dinner, and a very funny comedian. Day one done!
Tomorrow, Ibiza.
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