KayAnnie

We really enjoyed Tunisia as well. Dougga is one of the highlights of our overseas traveling.

KayAnnie, that sure helps...thank you for the great information! (We love to walk, late 40's and early 50's, but we can genuinely imagine your walk over that bridge in Barcelona. We'll take the shuttle to town.) Perhaps, I should mention that we are planning on doing most of our shore excursions "DIY", take photos, and post them later. We are open-minded and expect mistakes...just as long as we make it back on ship on time. :)

That is great. I am a total believer in DIY. I have built/am building a website about doing cruise ports on your own and would love your input on the ports I haven't been to when you get back if you are willing. And yeah, that bridge was brutal. We each had a travel backpack weighing like 30 lbs a piece because we were boarding in Barcelona. Our dining partners later brought it up like "oh my gosh, we saw these people walking over that huge bridge today with backpacks from our cab." We got a big laugh out of it. :)

I am not Hank, but I can help :)

Hank, we have a few questions:

 

Messina to Taormina: Train or bus? Ship is docked from 10am to 7pm. We wanted to see the clock "perform" at noon in Messina, do we have enough time to go to Taormina and make it back?

You do not have enough time to get to Taormina and back in 2 hours as the train ride takes 1 hour to the train station below the town(you still have to catch a 10 minute bus up) and the busfrom Messina is longer. We took the train/bus combo and barely shopped at all, visited the Greek theatre and were back by about 1:15. I think that is about as quick as it can be done.

 

Livorno: Ship is docked 7am to 7pm. Is the train station walking distance from the ship? Per your advice, we plan on visiting Florence first then stop in Pisa (via train), only if we have time. This is the one DIY we are apprehensive about because of the distance...

Train is not within walking distance to the port. You must take a shuttle to the center of town, then a bus to the Train station or a cab directly to the train station. (I LOVE Florence)

 

Barcelona: Is Las Ramblas walking distance from the ship? Are there shuttles we can take from the ship/port to town? Are the local bus/subway/train easy to navigate and use?

NO! My husband and I did the walk and it was horrible over this huge bridge. There is a shuttle bus called the blue bus which takes you to the foot of the Ramblas (Christopher Colombus Monument) for 2 one way or 3 round trip. The local metro is indeed easy to navigate and is cheap. You can buy a ticket called the T10 for 7.80 which gives you 10 journeys which you can share between multiple people. So, only one ticket per family.

Those are the ones I knew about, I hope it helps a little. :)

As for the sports bar question, there really wasn't a sports bar to speak of. In the Sportsquare area, it is advertised as having "the big game" on the tv's on the outside bar over there, but in the Med, there was nothing playing. One day the casino tv's had racing playing. That is pretty much it.

Oh, and no Queen Tribute band. The bands were Blood Power, The Magic Show Band and a duo from Europe.