BREEZEing through the Mediterranean 6/27 - 7/9/12

[brendacruise]

Hey Becky, how lmany days would you spend pre cruise in Barcelona if you had a week? I am going next year. Thanks

[seabrookcruiser]

Becky...

What a great review and I am loving your pics. So many bring back memories from our cruise out of Barcelona last year on the Magic. Looking forward to what you will be posting tomorrow.

We will be going back to Barcelona in Oct/Nov for the last Mediterranean cruise and the TransAtlantic on the Breeze. I've been taking notes about the restaurants, etc. you have been writing about. Thanks for all the great details. You have answered a couple of questions I had this time.

It's funny, we stayed at the Hotel Continental on Las Ramblas last time which as you pointed out is the sister property to your hotel. We will stay there again two nights pre-cruise while in Barcelona. Their rooms are also very pink! We agree, the 24 hour complimentary buffet was very convenient.

Looking foward to what you write tomorrow!

[luckybecky]

Originally Posted by dchoney

Thanks for the heads up on adjoining cabins. I recently booked the Breeze for August 2013 and I placed in an adjoining cabin by my PVP. I've been so worried about it and you have now confirmed my fears! Thanks. I plan to call and request a change immediately.

Great review! I am enjoying reading it and all the great pictures!

Yes, the door definitely seemed to be the weak link. This was also true of the hall door. There was not too much traffic in the hallway, but we could definitely hear when people were talking out there. I never heard a peep from above, below, or from the cabin on the other side that did not have the adjoining door.

I hope you can get your cabin changed. I always travel with a good set of ear plugs and I used these every night on the trip. They helped a lot. Plus, we were always so exhausted from sightseeing, I nearly went into a coma most nights.

Have fun on your cruise!

[luckybecky]

Originally Posted by brendacruise

Hey Becky, how lmany days would you spend pre cruise in Barcelona if you had a week? I am going next year. Thanks

Hi Brenda,
I'm not sure what the right answer is. I loved Barcelona, but if I had a full week, I think I would definitely want to see more of Spain than just Barcelona. You could certainly spend the whole time in Barcelona and find plenty to do, but I think I would rather spend perhaps 2-3 days there, and use the rest of the time to see other parts of Spain, or even spend a few days in London or Paris. Whatever you do, I'm sure you'll have a fabulous time!

[brendacruise]

Thanks that is what I was thinking then I heard a week in Barcelona but I will do 3 in Paris and 3 in Barcelona...thanks

[FreezingInMichigan]

[quote=luckybecky;34816791]

Originally Posted by FreezingInMichigan

Becky:

Thank you for the pictures of the Continental! We're booked here for several days pre-cruise in April and my husband has said he'll deal with the pink for the 125 euros a day balcony overlooking La Rambla... lol I jotted down notes of your restaurant recommendations and walking tour photos. Much appreciated.

~ Sheryl

Sheryl, just a warning. There is the Hotel Continental, and there is the Hotel Continental Palacete. They are both run by the same people, and I believe both have the same pink decor, and the buffet, but they are two separate properties located a few blocks apart. The Continental is located south of Plaza Catalunya, on Las Ramblas proper. The Palacete is north of the Plaza about 2 blocks. Either way, I'm sure you'll enjoy your stay!

You're right - we're at the one a few blocks south. This may be typical of my first trip to Barcelona... walking down La Rambla, knocking on doors, "Are you my hotel?"

[rtw68]

Originally Posted by luckybecky

My word of advice is to look at deck plans. Do NOT get a cabin with a door to the adjoining cabin. This seemed to be the problem. We could clearly hear noises from the adjoining room, but heard nothing from the cabin on the other side. The door seemed to be the weak link here. Anyway, aside from this problem, we loved our cabin. It was spacious and comfortable.

DW & I were concerned about that. We have an adjoining room for our upcoming Cove cabin. Will need to pack some ear plugs!

[Baby_Bear]

Maybe you can move to a different cabin on the same floor? You have a few months to go, so hopefully there are still other similar cabins available.

I had a tense moment - checked out our cabin on our upcoming Breeze cruise and thank God, its not an adjoining cabin. We are less than 3 weeks from sailing and the cruise is full so there would have been no chance to change it. That's why this site is so great, you learn so much!

[QuattroRomeo]

Thank you for the great tips! Can you expand a bit about the aerobus? Do you take all your luggage on board with you? Or is it stored somewhere where you can'tsee it? Will it be hard to make your way to the hotel pulling luggage? We have read so much about watching for thieves that we don't know how we will fare especially after a tiring flight!Maybe we should grab a cab from Placa Catalunya to the hotel (we are staying at the other Continental)?Or is that not a problem?

[Rainorshine1]

OK, this is my second post so have no idea what I am doing. I was in B'lona two years ago and stayed in an apartment on Las Ramblas. It is great and I can say I was never worried about pick pockets. And, you will see lots of folks with their luggage. Just don't carry a big purse or wear a lot of jewelry if possible. There are tons of restaurants, and you can buy wine at any of the grocery stores for next to nothing. It's fun to just go in and look around. Don't forget a corkscrew.
And I just want to say that your trip log is wonderful. I love the pictures of the ship so far, and your choice of photos from the Sagrada and Parc Guell I did not think the Gaudi museum in the parc was that great so save your money.
Can't wait to see the rest of your trip. The heads up on the duty free is awesome as well...

[luckybecky]

Originally Posted by QuattroRomeo

Thank you for the great tips! Can you expand a bit about the aerobus? Do you take all your luggage on board with you? Or is it stored somewhere where you can'tsee it? Will it be hard to make your way to the hotel pulling luggage? We have read so much about watching for thieves that we don't know how we will fare especially after a tiring flight!Maybe we should grab a cab from Placa Catalunya to the hotel (we are staying at the other Continental)?Or is that not a problem?

Hi Ray and Pam!

Here's a website which has lots of details about transportation from the airport.
http://www.barcelona-tourist-guide.c...transport.html
In fact, this website is a good resource about visiting Barcelona in general.

Your hotel is very close to the Plaza. It would not be worth the trouble to hail a cab. You can walk there in 5 minutes. And, as RainorShine pointed out, there are lots of people with luggage. Just print out a map of your hotel location and have it handy so when you step off the bus you'll know where to go.

I bought Borch brand maps for several of our ports on Amazon. They were about $7 each and are made of a laminated paper that is very durable and we used them constantly.

The bus was not too crowded when we rode it (no one had to stand). The luggage rack is located in the center of the bus and it was easy to keep an eye on your luggage.

I also had heard that pickpockets are a huge problem. We did not have any trouble but we did take precautions and stayed vigilant.

Enjoy your trip!

[luckybecky]

Here's the thallasotherapy pool. It looked great, I would have liked to try it.







Ladies' locker room:

[luckybecky]

Couples massage room. Does this look great, or what?!







Single massage room:




Here's an inside massage room:

[luckybecky]

The gym







Sauna



This is the hallway with massage rooms on either side. There were a lot of them!

[luckybecky]

All those spa pictures were taken before sailaway. They have the spa open doing tours. I dodged the tour (sales pitch!) and just wandered around on my own. After sailing, the spa is not accessible to just walk in, you have to pay for access to most areas. I think the gym and sauna are free to use.

Here are more ship photos that I took that afternoon:

Ovation theater



Breeze Bar in the atrium



Sapphire dining room (sorry, I missed getting photos of the Blush dining room)

[luckybecky]

Arcade





Outside area of Red Frog Rum Bar



Limelight Lounge (this is where the Punchliner Comedy Club happens in the evenings)

[luckybecky]

So back to our story:

Sailaway was delayed a bit, first because they were still loading supplies, and then there was something about having to wait for a ferry to go by. We were scheduled to depart at 5:00pm but didn’t start backing away from the pier until 6:30pm, and then it took awhile to get turned around. This was disappointing for us because we had Steakhouse reservations at 7:00, so if there was a sail-away party, we missed it. The lido deck had been cleared of chairs, but nothing was happening yet when we left for the Steakhouse. Here are some shots as we pulled out of the port. As you can see, the Barcelona port is industrial and not very picturesque.

Here's the ping pong table on (I think) deck 11 near the forward elevators. It was popular, people were always playing there.

[luckybecky]

The Steakhouse was good. Whether it is worth the extra cost, well I guess that just depends on the individual. I think it was, but I would not do it every night.

For starters, we each were presented with a small appetizer (both different), mine was an excellent chilled tomato soup and some little thing on a spoon – I don’t know what it was.

We had a choice of focaccia or brioche, which were served with butter, some sort of eggplant thing kind of like a chutney, and a tomato confit.

I had french onion soup which was out of this world.

Then a spinach salad without the mushrooms which was excellent, Paul had a Caesar salad.

[luckybecky]

Main course was a strip steak (cooked perfectly) with wasabi mashed potatoes and roasted garlic. Sorry about the poor quality of my photos.

Paul tried the steak and lobster combo.

I had the chocolate sampler for dessert. This was to die for! The sampler alone was almost worth the price of admission if you are a chocolate lover!

I don't remember what Paul had for dessert -- I was too busy swooning over the chocolate sampler. Because we went on the first night, we also got a free bottle of wine with our meal. You can choose a white or red Santa Carolina. We arrived at 7:00, were out at 8:30.

[GRAMMYTAN]

From your steakhouse pictures, it appears that everyone is dressed very casually. You said you went on the first night, so is that why or is it always that casual? I was also surprised that there were no tablecloths on the tables. The food, however, looked great!