London

After 108 days, we departed our home onboard Crystal Serenity and have taken up residence in London at The Stafford Hotel for a short four days. We managed to hit London just as spring has arrived in all its wonderful glory!  

On Wednesday night, we took in a musical, Billy Elliot, with some friends from the ship and thoroughly enjoyed it.  The next evening we met up with another couple from the ship and had drinks at Claridge's and a wonderful lebanese dinner at Al Hamra in Shepherd's Market. Friday, we spent shopping - Fortnum and Mason's for lunch, Turnbull and Asser for shirts and ties and then Harrods! 

George and I walked all over London on Saturday. People filled the streets and the parks enjoying the weather.

 Buckingham Palace

The Horse Guards

St. James Park

Big Ben

We caught the clock at Fortnum & Mason striking 6 PM, and the action began!


Here is George at the back courtyard at The Stafford Hotel.  Our room is at the very back corner on the second floor of the mews -- The Stubbs Room. 

We've enjoyed our trip immensely and hate for the  journey to end.  But we are looking forward to seeing friends and family again so soon!

La Coruna

La Coruna port skyline is comprised of numerous city homes with their many-paned galleries looking out to the sea, with the open sidewalk patios where the fishermen used to sell fish fresh from the sea.

Just off the embarcadero along the port is the main square of La Coruna, with this fantastic City Hall building and its streets of shops.  On the other side of town are fantastic beaches for vacationing Spaniards from Madrid!


After an hour long drive through the green spring countryside of Spain, we arrived at an old Roman village of Betanzos ("Brigantium" in Roman time). The town sits on a hill where there used to be a hill-fort, on the mouth of the Betanzos estuary, where sea mixes with the freshwaters of the Mandeo and Mendo rivers. It was one of the seven capitals of the Old Kingdom of Galicia. Remarkable are the "pazos" (Galician country houses) seen here in the main plaza of the old city.


Three Gothic churches are within a few steps of each other.  The churches of Santiago, Santa María do Azogue and San Francisco.   The stone cross of Santa Maria is depicted above looking through to the roofline of the Church of San Francisco with its stone sculpture of a wild boar. In the sanctuary of Santa Maria, the main altar takes your breath away. 


The Church of San Francisco contains fascinating medieval sarcophagi, such as the tomb of Pérez de Andrade, held up by two animals that symbolise his lineage: the wild boar and the bear.

Lisbon & Fatima

Upon our arrival in Lisbon, we took a bus ride to Fatima to do a short pilgrimage.  We arrived the week before the anniversary of Our Lady's first apparition to the 3 children of Fatima during 1917. There were only a couple of thousand people at the plaza, rather than the 250,000 that arrive for the anniversary.  We lit a candle at the small shrine on the actual spot of the apparitions and proceeded to the basilica. 

Jacinta and Francisco Marto, who both died of influenza before they reached the age of 11, were proclaimed blessed in 2000 by Pope John Paul. The third visionary, Sister Lucia dos Santos, a 97-year-old nun, died in 2005. Inside the basilica are the graves of all 3. The decoration above the grave of Jacinta is beautiful in its simplicity.

Back in Lisbon, we proceeded through the stone arch which dominates the waterfront and is the entrance to a large pedestrian mall.  The mall was full of tourists and the people of Lisbon enjoying a wonderful spring Saturday evening.  We had a great meal at one of the local restaurants off the plaza.

 We didn't have time for a cable car ride through the city, but we will need to return to visit this great port city!

Gibraltar

Crystal Serenity docked at Gibraltar for one half day, so that we could take a look at the Straits and see Africa.  We couldn't see more than a shadow of Africa through the overcast skies, but we were there!  Of course there are forts and fortifying walls, embattlements and cannons built to protect such a significant entry to the Mediterranean Sea (even a mosque -- but we've seen enough mosques on this trip), but otherwise  not too much to see.

Inside the Rock though are the most mysterious caves, St. Michael's Caves, with stalagmites and stalagtites.  The caves are big enough for a small theater, for concerts and theatre events!

Also on the Rock are groups of Barbary Apes, brought across the Straits from Morocco.  Of course, now they are a tourist attraction, and anxious to pick our pocket!

Valencia

Valencia, Spain!  What  glorious city on a glorious day!

Beautiful architecture and artistry wherever  you looked from Roman to Gothic to modern. First we visited the Valencia Cathedral, built over several centuries beginning in the 13th century and ending with the 18th century entry to the basilica.   The Santo Cáliz Chapel (1674) has a vaulted ceiling with star motifs, an image of heaven with the 12 apostles and the coronation of the Virgin Mary with a rich blue background that the picture below only begins to capture.  The dome of the cathedral is beautiful carved alabaster -- letting light in through its lacy openings.


Not to be missed in the side chapel pictured below is a relic of the Holy Grail, from the 1st century AD which, tradition has it, Jesus used to institute the Holy Eucharist.

At the other end of the old river bed that runs through the city, which is now filled with parks, playgrounds and museums, are the newest buildings in the city -- buildings conceived by the world-renowned (and city-born) architect Santiago Calatrava. He produced the futuristic City of Arts and Sciences (Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències), which contains an opera house/performing arts centre, a science museum, an IMAX cinema/planetarium, an oceanographic park and other structures such as the long covered walkway where George and I took a picture.

Not to be missed on a tour of this city, are the buildings dedicated to the America's Cup sailing vessels, which Valencia hosted in 2007. Pictured below is the Oracle/BMW building which sponsored San Francisco's entry to the 2007 races. People were hard at work at the major buildings, making preparations for the 2010 America's Cup. Wouldn't it be nice to be here for that!

Monte Carlo

From the mountaintop Monte Carlo Golf Club, George took a picture of the Crystal Serenity in the harbor so far below.   He played a nice round of golf (91) on the hilly par 72 course with his two partners Jim and Vincent.   He took a few golf lessons on the boat and is looking forward to spending some time on the golf course when we return home (sigh). It was a beautiful day and evening here, viewing the outstanding yachts in the harbor and walking through the beautiful city.

Roma

We only had a day to spend in Rome -- and it was again a beautiful spring day! So we started off with a stop at the Spanish Steps and then continued on to the Trevi Fountain to toss in a coin -- and wish for more time the next time we are here!

Rome on a 3 day weekend was crawling with people, so we saw all of our favorite places from the second level of the Big Red Bus!   We finished up at St. Peter's in time for 5 PM Mass in the Basilica -- what a beautiful way to end the day.

The ship hosted a wonderful dinner that evening at Santo Spirito, a 14th century hospital, just steps away from the Vatican.  We had a great dinner with lots of wine and were entertained by a harp quartet followed by a superb performance by two tenors and a soprano from St. Cecilia Institute of Music!