Burn My Time

This is super quick copy/paste from my txt scribblings about the trip. It has no pictures and has not been at all proofed to make any sense at all. I’m out in the ocean somewhere paying $.75/minute for internet. Bah. Pictures will come when I find some real non-satellite based internet. (Zippy: Miss you! Love you!) I should be in Monte Carlo or something like that tom. Can’t say I keep up with the itinerary or location well. I’ve learned I’m not eating the food anymore and I say ‘merci’ for lack of any better word. lol. thank you! hehe.

Day 1
written
When? 5:16pm Barcelona time, 10:19am Central time
Where? Yaught Club (lounge) on the cruise ship sitting next to the Ipod station.

Wow. Flying across the country into a Time Zone seven hours before your own is crazy. I was too busy ‘tying up loose ends’ to get more than a wink of sleep Friday night. Paul & I left for the Kansas City Airport at 8:30, flew out at 11, and arrived at Newark, NJ a few hours later. We flew out of Newark somewhere around 7:pm so it got dark for while when we were in the air and before ya knew it, it was light again as we touched down in Barcelona at 9:30am.

As the company sponsoring the trip was trying to get all their passangers organized Paul and I took off and walked around the city for a while. I have some pretty cool pictures. Barcelona is a hoppin place. They keep the part of the city we were in quite clean considering how many people I saw stampeding through the roads. I’ll post pictures when I can.

I ended up getting on the second to the last bus heading to the ship from the hotel gathering spot. A couple hours later I participated in a fantastic fire drill. It’s always a little funny watching everyone walk around with the old school orange life vests on trying to find their ‘Muster Station’. Here I am now trying to stay awake. Between friday night, the crappy sleep you get on airplanes, and jet-lag, I’m now looking forward to a fantastic night of deep sleep as the ship rocks and sways me into a comfortable nights rest. ^_^

day 2
Written
When? 12:56am Barcelona time, 5:56pm Central time
Where? Estate Room 262 (mine) at the desk.

I still have yet to find a 110 plugin that will let me charge up so I may have to make this short. Last night (Sunday) I ended up meeting a bunch of cool people and spent the night at the blackjack tables until somewhere around 4.am ship time. I drank 4 Long Island Ice Teas after a few too many beers and woke up this morning feeling it something fierce. At the blackjack tables I made a complete fool of myself as I learned how to play real blackjack. I know now but during the night I went up pretty high but still managed to walk away with nothing in the end. Go figure. After they closed the casino on a few of us we all went back to our estate rooms to sleep. Paul ended up dragging me out of bed at 8.am ship time to go on our first shore excursion. Unfortunately I didn’t bring my camera. I thought I lost it the night before. Free drinks will get ya. I stuck to drinking water today. Walking around a few castles in france with a tour guide did not do my hangover any good.

I made got back to the ship around 2 when Paul and I ate some lunch and relaxed the rest of the day. I took a long nap to finish recouperating from the night before. The ship set sail again at 5.pm. I rolled out of bed around 8.pm and headed back to the casino. I ended up leaving the casino after winning $150 as to even out all my losses from the previous day. I may play a little more but I am definately not losing more than $100 to that blackjack table again. ^_^

After leaving the Casino happy I took up exersizing for an hour and a half. Bike, Stairs, weights, bike, done. Now, since it’s 1.am ship time, I’m going to finish this new york cheese cake and fruit salad I ordered and call it a night. I hope I can find a place to buy a 220 to 110 converter tomorrow. My laptop can plug straight in to 220 but the plugin style is incorrect. Bummer.

Next time I cross the pond Zippy is coming with. I can’t stop thinking about how much more fun this would be if Zippy was here. This is an amazing trip but it would be 100% more spectacular if she was here. I miss ya babe and can’t wait until we can tour Europe together. We’ll stay away from the boats and explore the country ourself from land. hehe.

goodnight.

day 3
Written
When? 10:57pm ship time, 4:00pm central time
Where? Estate Room 262 (mine) at the desk.

I ended up waking up late today. Fortunately Paul didn’t schedule any shore excursions for us. Our day started around 11:am ship time when we went on shore and saw a huge castle high on a ridge. We both thought to ourselves it would be impossible to walk to it but said out loud that we were going to walk to it. About an hour and a half later we had made it. It ended up being a church of sorts so we didn’t stay long but we were both amazed at the fact that we actualy made it to the top of the hill we were hiking. After making it back down to the port we just sat on land and drank an array of different flavored wine. I can’t believe how crappy the service is. I know I’m making an extremely generalized remark but we went to a handful of open cafes and the service was horrible. I’m not eating any more french food if I can get away with it. If I do have to eat any I’m only going to order food that requires absolutely no cooking. I hope I don’t get sick because the hamburger I ordered from one of the restaurants was not done at all. It makes me cringe thinking about it. I’ll post a picture of it so everyone else can get sick just by looking at it. lol. The shell of the burger was brown and the inside was just pure red and completely raw. Not even like ‘rare’. It was raw. They wouldn’t take it back and get me another without us making another order and since the food is so darn expensive and the exchange rate for usd to euro is absolutely crap I figured it’d be better to go back to the ship and eat. Crazyness. That about makes the whole day. We get to go to Monte Carlo tomorrow! Although we are staying for two days I’m going to get to sleep early and start adventuring in the morning. I can’t wait.

4:09pm