Trip Report Our 19-Day Mediterranean Adventure – Greece, Turkey and the Search for Free Wifi

Finally, right? It seems like I’ve been waiting forever to start this, but really we’ve only been back three weeks! And in that time I’ve lived in a hotel for two weeks and driven across the country from Washington DC to our new home in...wait for it...Las Vegas! For some reason I have chosen now, surrounded by boxes that need to be unpacked, as the time to start my trip report. Stalling maybe? :D So here it goes!

What: A massive 19 day (13 days on the cruise with 6 more including travel time and extra days in Europe) trip extravaganza. A 12 night Mediterranean cruise with a day in London beforehand and a few days in London and Barcelona afterwards. So yes. This is going to be a long stinking trip report. Oh, and I took 5239 pictures. On my camera! That doesn’t even count the Instagram/iphone photos you’ll see scattered throughout the report.

Great day in the morning.

Why: Because cruises are awesome mostly. But also because I was able to do a last-minute 11 night Med cruise back in April of 2010 with my daughter and some other family and friends, so this was a makeup cruise for my son and husband. It worked nicely as a graduation trip/present. :)

When: June 13-July 1, 2013

I booked this cruise the day it came out, back in January of 2012.

As time got closer we realized it was going to get crazy. My daughter was going to have to miss the last day of school, my son was graduating from high school the Saturday before the trip, we had a house full of family that whole weekend and a big graduation party on Sunday, he then left and was coming home one day early from his senior trip to make it on time, and we were moving across the country to Las Vegas so our household goods were all moved the day before we left. Then the kids were traveling with their youth group to Scotland 3 days after the cruise ended, so it really didn’t make sense for us to come all the way back home and we needed to stay in Europe for three more days before we dropped them off in London Heathrow. Got all that? Yes. Like I said, a little crazy.

Totally worth it though. :)

Who: Us! Here we are a few days before we left! This picture is a celebration of the whole Whiting family – but mostly Chase. The high school graduate. Also appearing in this photo are myself-Tammy, hubby-Stephen, and daughter – Ally.



My parents! My parents were on our last Med cruise, and have been in several of my trip reports. They had quite the trip in store for them. Here they are in Monaco:



My in-laws! My in-laws were also on my last Med cruise, as well as a few other cruises with us, so they may look familiar if you've ever read one of my reports. Here they are in Palo:



My brother-in-law! Scott has appeared in a few trip cruise trip reports as well. He’s the oldest of three boys with my hubby falling in the middle. Here he is in Mykonos:

 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
After our near brush with royalty, we walked back to the underground.







We passed Hyde Park:



We had about 30 minutes in the room before we needed to go check in. Stephen had taken a nap, showered and was feeling pretty good.

We walked to the terminal and checked in with our bags. Oops. We had one too many bags.

At the last minute before leaving we decided Stephen would check two bags so we could bring a hang up bag. Military flying with United can check an extra bag at no charge. Well unfortunately this leg was on British Air and we had to pay. 40 pounds! Ouch!

We then had an amusing conversation with my parents when I told them we had to pay for a bag. They asked how much? I said “40 pounds.”

They said, “No, how much did you pay.”

I said, “40 pounds!”

It took us a minute to sort that out.

We’re in!



45 minutes of free Wi-Fi!



I think we all slept on this flight. We did get a nice snack wrap before we landed.
 
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Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
We arrived in Barcelona about 10:00, so we were ready for bed! Thankfully there was no customs line here. We went to find our hotel shuttle. They were just pulling away so we had to wait about 15 minutes.



Hi Chase. :)



Some of us didn’t appreciate having their picture taken after being awake for 36 hours:



The driver laughed when he saw all our bags, but we made it!

Here’s the hotel. It was the Hotel Ciutat Del Prat. It wasn’t bad at all considering what we paid on Hotwire. The rooms only slept 2, so we ended up with two rooms.

The lobby was verrrrrrrrrry pink:



It takes a long time to check into hotels in Europe. This was no exception.

Here’s our room:



Bathroom:



The kids were next door. We found their clothes and confirmed what time they needed up. Then we all went to sleep! Finally!

Tomorrow we were boarding the Magic! Yay!!
 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Looking forward to your cruise.

Thank you for reading, ginadee! More coming soon!

Beautiful pictures of London!

Thank you, Kristia! :)

Loving the report Tammy! And all this before a 12 day cruise haha! Cant wait to see more

I know! This is the longest build up ever! Haha!

Yeah!!! I'm so excited to read this report. Can't wait for more.

More is coming! :)

I love your report so far! I hope to do a similar trip next summer. I cannot wait to read more.

You need to farrellbarrel!

Oh my gosh, I can't believe you actually considered not going back for your camera.....thankfully it was just a momentary lapse in judgement :)

It was a horrible lapse in judgement! What was I thinking? Thank goodness I regained my senses.

Loving your TR so far. This is my dream vacay so I'm looking forward to your full Magic write up!! Keep it coming!!

Thank you, WDW_Princess24!
 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day 3 – Embarkation

Finally, the big day had arrived! Woo hoo!!

We didn’t have breakfast included with our rate and there weren’t many options nearby, so we all kind of toughed it out through breakfast. We knew we’d be eating well soon enough. :)

We had some pretzels from the day before and a croissant from the plane still. We were like scavengers. :D

If you remember my shower picture from yesterday, you may have noticed the shower has a typical European door, or lack thereof, and the floor was soaked after we finished our showers. We couldn’t seem to figure that out.

After we rallied the kids, we went downstairs and waited for the shuttle. It was about 10 minutes late and we already had a later scheduled time than I would have liked. I knew my chances of an upgrade were slipping away but I told myself it was probably better not to spend that much anyway. So I was at peace. :)

Here we are on the sidewalk:







Our hotel:







 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster




We took a chance with our scheduled shuttles and we knew it. If we booked something the website said would accommodate all of our luggage it would cost twice as much, so we decided to book something we could fit in people wise and took our chances. If worse came to worst we knew someone could jump in a cab with some bags and we’d still come out ahead.

Here's the problem:



When the shuttle driver pulled up, he did a double take at our luggage. We crammed, held stuff, and we made it!



On our way selfie!





 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Here’s the check in line:







Today’s Navigator:



The in-laws were already there. We met up after checking in. They had boarding group 4 which was a little weird because we all had the same scheduled arrival time and they even got to the terminal before us.



Here’s the waiting area:





Minnie was there of course:

 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster




Here was the picture set up:



They started calling numbers pretty quickly and we boarded around 11:45.

Here we go!







After our name was announced and the cheering stopped, our first stop was Rocking Bar ‘D to try to get our Palo reservations linked up. They was ready for us. As soon as I gave them our stateroom number, he told us he had noticed we were on different times and tables and had already tried to find something for us for brunch and we were set in the private room for dinner.
 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Then it was time for one of our favorite meals. Embarkation lunch at Parrot Cay. Here’s my plate:



We saw a couple of people I knew from the boards and a couple of servers we knew.



Father in law was happy with the ice cream:



After stuffing ourselves, we walked up top to see the sights. There was a big cloud/marine layer hanging over.





The pool deck was still sunny:













 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Some crew members were at the crew pool:



Here’s the terminal from above:



People were swimming:





Palo!



At 1:30 we walked down to the room. Hello room!

That was weird; we got the old Castaway Club bag:





Some of our papers:



Our bathroom:





Me!



Our stateroom host was named Kenneth which we thought was funny since my Dad’s name was Kenneth. My parents were right next door but had a different host named Albert.

We tried not to sleep and thankfully our bags started coming at a pretty quick pace. We unpacked until the lifeboat drill and Sail Away party which are coming next!
 
Thanks for sharing your reports. Can't believe your son graduated!! Seems like yesterday that we were reading reports when he was just a boy. Tell him congratulations!!
 

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