Sardinia, Italy

Today we are in Cagliari, the largest city on the island of Sardinia, Italy. We went on another tour. What we're discovering is that the history of all the places we're visiting is basically the same.

Most history dates back to 6,000 BC. Several empires controlled the areas over the centuries until the Christians took over. History in a nutshell.  😃 

We started out by driving up to a lookout. Views of different parts of the city.

Next, we stopped at a popular beach. It's Sunday, and the weather is beautiful. It was also some type of local celebration, so busy, busy, busy!!

The tour advertised seeing pink flamingos. We drove past a nature preserve, and only saw them zipping by out the window. I managed to get a fuzzy picture. 

Our next stop was the former Royal Armory. It's now a history museum. Here's where things went downhill.

 The audio units we were given to hear our guide worked very poorly. Combined with trying to understand someone with an accent and poor equipment, it was very difficult to understand anything. 

The museum covers the period from 6,000 BC to Medieval times. Lots of old stuff!

Amazing jewelry from thousands of years ago

Incredible skills

As we left the museum, people started dropping out. Our poor guide was trying to be nice while collecting their audio devices. This wasted a bunch of time for the rest of us, and it happened at a couple of our stops. By the end more than half had left.

Next, we went to the main plaza in the old city. The Royal Palace, Archbishop's Palace and the Cathedral were all located here. Construction of these buildings was from the 13th century with renovations in the 16th and 17th centuries. 

Royal Palace 

Royal Palace on the right back with Archbishop's Palace in front of it

Cathedral 

Beautiful painting on ceiling of Cathedral. Mass was being held, so we were only allowed a quick walk along the back wall.

Lots of old towers and walls from fortresses throughout. It's quite amazing how newer buildings are right next to ancient ruins.

On the far left side above, you can see part of a tower. This was originally a tower of the old wall, and was incorporated into the new construction.

We sure don't have all these old ruins and churches in the USA. So much history in Europe. 

Whenever you sign up for a tour, its a crap shoot as to what type of guide you get.  We've had one really good one yesterday, one who was okay, and one we had great trouble understanding. Our guide today was really trying. It wasn't his fault his company provided inferior equipment. It wasn't a great tour, but I felt sorry for him.

Corsica, France

Today we are visiting the island of Corsica, France, docking at the largest city of Ajaccio.

This little boat was taking the very heavy ropes from the ship to some of the moorings.

Here's the view from our balcony.  The cruise ship next to us is advertised as a luxury experience by Explora, a division of MSC cruises. 

We did a tour of Corsica, the birthplace of Napoleon Bonaparte. I found it strange that this island is part of France, when all of the surrounding islands are Italian. 

Turns out, back in the 1700s, it was under Italian rule. For about fifteen years in the mid 1700s they were able to become independent due to the efforts of Pascal Paoli. He studied in Florence during the age of enlightenment. He came back to Corsica and wrote the first articles of Democracy in the world. Every household had two votes. He is considered the hero of Corsica.

The French invaded in 1768, and they won. Paoli had to flee so he wouldn't be beheaded. The French banned the Corsican language in public, and made the only language French. In the 1970s, that ban was lifted. About 30 percent of the inhabitants are bilingual and speak both languages. 

There was also a period where pirates and slave traders came to the island. About seventy watch towers were built on the smaller islands surrounding Corsica. If pirate or slave ships were spotted, smoke would be released at the towers. That allowed everyone to hide in the dense forested areas in the mountains.  The slave traders stole white and black people, especially children. Some towers still remain. 

Corsica's main economy is tourism. They are known for beautiful beaches and warm weather attracting many French tourists.

According to our guide, they have so many tourists that they can't catch enough fish to feed them all. There are fish farms out a bit from shore.

Napolean was born in 1769 to a semi noble family. At age nine he was sent to military school on the mainland. He was a brave soldier, fighting right alongside his troops, winning many battles. He got greedy and power crazy, and ended up exiled. Our guide was very knowledgeable, and we learned a great deal more about him. Too much to include here.  😃 

Many streets, plazas and shops sport his name. There is a very large monument dedicated to him.

He is depicted with his hand over his stomach. It is said he often stood that way because he had stomach pain. He died in exile at age 51 of stomach cancer.

We did a bit of a walking tour in the old town area. We saw the house Napoleon was born in and lived at as a child. 

Typical street in old town.

There is a cathedral in the old town built in 1577. Pope Francis who recently passed away made his last foreign visit there six months before his death. 

 

Beautiful pipe organ

Upon our return to the ship, there was a smaller cruise ship docked between us and the Explora. It's owned by a French company called CroisiMe, and even had a small swimming pool. Total of 197 passengers. 

The day ended with another amazing sunset!

Barcelona, Spain

Our first cruise ended today in Barcelona. We could have stayed onboard, but wanted to a least see a bit of Barcelona. There are over 300 people staying on for the second cruise. The ship offered a free shuttle into town. We had prepurchased tickets for a hop on, hop off bus. 

There are at least seven cruise ships in the humongous port today. Once we were on the top deck of a bus, we decided to just do the 2.5 hour trip and not get off. There were long lines at each stop. 

We saw many areas of the huge city.  The city itself is 38 sq. miles with 1.6 million people.  However, the metropolitan area covers 1,249 sq. miles and 5.7 million people. We can attest to it being very crowded, and a traffic nightmare. 

It's hard to get decent pictures because there are many trees and parks. That's great for the residents, but not for photos.

Barcelona hosted the Olympics in 1992. We saw quite a few remaining venues. This is the main stadium and the fire cauldron. It was lit with a flaming arrow being shot at it!

This Communications tower was next to the stadium. It was designed by Calatrava to televise the 1992 Olympics. Our Wisconsin friends will recognize the Calatrava name as he designed the Milwaukee Art Museum. Too bad all communication towers aren't this beautiful!

Picture from the web 

We passed many amazing architectural buildings. I don't know what all of them are, but they were beautiful!

Original Customs building 1896

New architecture, Barcelona's largest bank needs two huge black towers

The red coliseum behind the statue in this plaza was a bull fighting ring. Bull fighting has been banned since the 1970s in Barcelona. 

The other side of the plaza had these two towers where they used to have public hangings. Yikes!

The highlight of the day was most definitely Sagrada Familia, the largest unfinished Catholic church in the world.  Designed by Antonio Gaudi, it was begun in 1882. As you can see by the cranes, they are still working on it. When it is finished, it will be the tallest church in the world. Words can't describe it. I've never seen anything like it!!

Picture from the web 

There are many statues sculpted into the construction on each side, depicting Christ's life. The detail is astounding!

Angel at top

Glass star atop a spire

Gaudi was a famous architect and designer, 1852-1926. He was hit by a tram and died, seeing only a small portion of the construction. He is buried inside.

It is now a Unesco World Heritage site, and was consecrated and declared a minor Basilica by the Pope in 2010. It has been built solely on donations. 

I would have loved to have had time to get off and walk around all sides, and visit the inside. I hear it's equally impressive. But, we didn't want to miss the ship!

One of the city squares has two gas street lamps designed by Gaudi in 1879. This stuff was built to last!

There is a 197 foot tall statue of Christopher Columbus built in 1888. His finger is pointing out to sea, but in the direction of Africa instead of the Americas. 😃 

We passed the stadium for Futbol Club Barcelona.  The stadium was undergoing a massive renovation. The soccer club was founded in 1899. It is the third most valuable in the world at $5.6 billion. It is one of the most widely supported and decorated clubs in the world. 

We spent quite a bit of time in a traffic jam caused by this protest. I wish I could read the sign on the mannequin on the front of the truck. 

There were many interesting and pretty trees and flowers. I've never seen this kind of tree.

On the way we saw these five cruise ships lined up. Ours is the second one with the water slide. There were at least two more at different piers. I've never seen such a busy port!

A view of the city from our top deck. 

There are a lot of cargo ships out there. I'm assuming they're waiting their turn to enter. 

Another interesting day in Spain!